by Simon Clark
Beth tilted her head. ‘There goes the all-clear siren.’
‘So, nothing to worry about. Back to the bar, ladies.’ Alec now adopted a jovial all’s-well-with-the-world persona, evidently to reassure Sally. ‘Maybe we can persuade Eleanor to serve us all a snifter or two. I daresay we could do with a tot of the strong stuff.’
Beth told Alec to lead the way with Sally. The woman still shot fearful glances back at the grate. When the pair had left the basement, Beth returned to the grate. Below her feet, dark waters swirled. The smell of brine prickled the sensitive membranes of her nose. From this angle, she could just make out the throat of the tunnel through which the waves entered. Certainly, it would be big enough for a man to pass through. Then she transferred her attention from the pulsating body of water to the bars themselves. A moment later she plucked something from a flake of rust.
How did you describe him, Sally? A man wearing a white shirt? Between her fingers a strand of white cotton fluttered in that blood-freezing updraught.
Seven
Through Whitby’s dark and deserted streets they came. Six figures moved swift as panthers along narrow canyons formed by unbroken lines of cottages. Not a light showed through the blacked-out windows. Clocks struck midnight. In gun emplacements on the cliff top, soldiers had to clap their heavily gloved hands together to chase away the cold. For now, the sky remained empty of Nazi bombers. Though the troops were alert to threats from both sea and air, they did not see the boy run silently by the abbey ruins in the direction of the graveyard of St Mary’s Church. Loping alongside him, a sleek, black dog.
Many a time the boy had watched the pack of figures led by the man in white. The predatory way they moved had always persuaded him not to get too close. But he noticed that now more people had joined the group. Tonight, a lady in a pale nightdress ran with them. Their eagerness to reach their destination, coupled with an air of excitement, encouraged the boy to follow, albeit in secret. Swiftly, the pack descended the long flight of cliff-side steps to the houses below. For now, they seemed no more substantial than flitting shadows. When they reached the Leviathan Hotel, they didn’t even pause. They climbed the smooth walls, with the same ease they’d raced along Church Street. There, they went from window to window, trying to peer in past the heavy blackout material. When that failed, they pressed their ears to the glass panes to listen to whatever occurred within.
Accompanied by the dog, the boy followed as far as the wall that encircled the rear yard. There he concealed himself in all-engulfing darkness to wait and see what the strange, predatory figures did next.
In the cottage, Theo stood in the dark, the light out and the curtains open wide. His eyes were fixed on the figures swarming over the hotel’s exterior. They moved across the walls with fluid grace, their fingertips hooking into the gaps between the bricks. Moving swiftly from window to window, they appeared to be searching for someone. One figure, in a pilot’s uniform, complete with goggles and leather flying helmet, tried to see through Eleanor’s bedroom window. A woman in a billowing nightdress climbed up to the roof to where he, himself, had stood earlier. Then, Theo had been listening to the call of the many from the cave. They were growing restless. They’d been trapped for centuries. They wanted out.
Theo heard their call, which sounded like a song shot through with a haunting melody – such yearning; such an unquenchable desire that excited them yet pained them, too. The woman ran lightly, and utterly without fear, around the low wall that separated the hotel roof from forty feet of thin air. The pale nightdress fluttered.
Theo saw another figure. This one he recognized as Gustav Kirk . . . or at least it had been once. On all fours Theo scurried up the brickwork to Eleanor’s apartment. There he tried to work his fingers into the gap between the frame and the window in order to slide it open.
Theo sensed Gustav’s longing. He sensed it in the other men and women, too. Still gazing at the intruders, he ran his fingers over the scars on his chest. Dimly, he recalled the sensation of teeth crunching through the skin. How they’d gnawed at his torso in excitement. How the vampire’s mouth had pulsated, as she sucked hard. Viciously, she’d drawn the blood from his veins. Those memories made the bite-marks tingle. Theo longed to join Gustav and his friends, but Eleanor had made sure that he wouldn’t run with his kind.
He closed his eyes, fingered the tingling stigmata on his chest, and listened to the song of those still trapped in the cave. But not trapped for long. Theo was certain of that.
Sally worked in her room, the film script in front of her. Lines always gave her trouble; sometimes, shamefully, she’d corpsed in the plays she’d performed in. Yet she was determined to memorize her part to perfection. Heaven help her, she’d be word perfect. If she made a success of this, her first film, she’d be hired for other roles. Since she’d been a little girl she’d dreamt of being an actress. Whenever she sat in the cinema all her worries evaporated the moment the titles rolled up on the screen.
Sally knew people thought she was overexcitable, giggly, and sometimes downright scatterbrained. Her father had been forced to retire from work when he’d hurt his back at the factory. When she played the fool, or got ridiculously excited over something as trivial as her mother baking a cake, it made her disabled father smile. So, through her childhood, Sally had developed the habit of being silly and scatterbrained in order to distract Dad from that gnawing back pain. To her, it was the right thing to do. And what others thought of her? Well, they could go scoot; this was a small price to pay, if she could shine a little happiness into her father’s life. Now she’d do everything in her power to make a career in films. Already, she could send money home from time to time.
Sally went to the mirror to act out the scene. ‘Nathan, I don’t care that our families have been feuding for fifty years. I’m going to marry you. Your parents will have to accept me as their daughter-in-law. See this ring on my hand . . .’ No, get it right! ‘See this ring on my finger. It means . . .’
Sally paused. Wasn’t that a tapping at her window? A bird, perhaps? She shook her head, drew a deep breath, then launched herself back into the role. ‘See this ring on my finger. It means we’re betrothed. If I’m not going to let those Nazi nitwits stop this wedding, I’m not going to let our families stop it, either.’ Nazi nitwits? Would Alec agree to the phrase being changed? Maybe ‘Nazi henchmen’? The ‘nitwits’ phrase made it too much like comedy.
The tap sounded again on the window. An insistent tapping. But she was three floors from the ground. Curious, she approached the window, wondering what could be causing it.
Eleanor continued her preparations. In her self-contained apartment within the hotel, she worked steadily. She’d barely noticed the hands of the clock creep past midnight as she wielded the sharp knife. Carefully, she cut along chalked lines on the sheet of black rubber. Because the material couldn’t be sewn she had to hammer brass rivets through it when she needed join the pieces together. Utterly focused on the task, she connected strips of black rubber that would serve as belts, so she could fasten the garment at the back. It had been tempting to simply add fabric strips that could be quickly tied, rather than fiddling with cumbersome buckles. But she knew that no cotton-based fabric could be used in the garment. It must be rubber and metal. Lastly, she riveted the section that would form a high, protective collar around the front of her throat. Not that it could be too high, as she’d have to be able to manoeuvre her head freely in order to see either her next phase of works, or, later, her prey. She set down the hammer, then absently ran her fingers over the puncture wounds that so steadfastly refused to heal on her wrist. Tonight they tingled. A permanent reminder of a past tragedy. Sighing, she put the sensation to the back of her mind. Nothing must distract her. It’s taken me twenty years to decide to act. I’ve been a fool to leave it so long. Nothing, but nothing, must stand in my way.
As she went to the mirror, to don the heavy rubber apron, she heard scratching on the window pane.
Of the four in the hotel, Alec had been the only one to fall asleep. He’d sat down in an armchair with the script on his lap. The uncomfortable night spent in the lorry had exhausted him. One moment he’d been writing Long shot of arriving lifeboat, the next, in his dreams, he floated along Whitby’s streets; a phantom-like presence. In a café he found the original director of the film (a powerfully built man with a shaved head), the casting director that he’d just taken on their first date (her lips were bright red, just like in life, yet her eyes were full of darkness); the director pushed out a chair for him to sit down and join them.
However, still wrapped deeply in the dream, Alec left the café to ghost through the night-time town. When fingernails tapped on his window, he never heard them.
Beth Layne lounged on her bed. It’d be so tempting to slip under the sheets. But like so many people now in wartime Britain, to allow oneself to relax in bed almost seemed to invite an air raid to start. Beth didn’t relish the thought of scurrying down to that icy basement in her nightgown. What’s more, so many thoughts swirled inside her head. They all had that irritating quality of a stone in a shoe. She wanted rid, yet they wouldn’t quit. So she replayed memories of Eleanor’s brother standing out on the roof, his open shirt revealing dozens of scars that resembled bite marks from human teeth. She doubted if any explanation of his injuries could be prised from Eleanor. And Sally had claimed a strange figure had lurked beneath the cellar grate. Since Beth had found a strand of white cotton caught on the bars, it quashed any hope that the intruder had been a product of Sally’s dream. Thoughts of the sea washing in through the tunnel to swirl around the bottom of the pit unsettled her, too. Whitby’s a strange place, she mused. It occupies an other-worldly borderland between heather-covered mountains and the ocean. And in this mysterious town sits an equally mysterious hotel. Whitby isn’t real. Whitby is a dream dreamt by the spirits. The sound of the window creaking made Beth sit up straight. She realized she’d begun to drift asleep. Now, however, a draught disturbed the heavy curtains. Yet she was convinced that the window had been locked shut.
Frowning, she stood up, before advancing warily towards the curtained opening.
Concealed by darkness, the boy and his dog watched those predatory forms scuttling over the face of the hotel. They were probing the windows, searching for a weak point. Now they were joined by the woman in the nightdress who looked like a pale flame in the night. She tapped a long finger against a glass pane.
Crouching, the boy put his arm around Sam.
The dog lightly pressed the side of his head against the boy’s cheek, a gesture of affection and reassurance, and shivered. Those creatures swarming over the building alarmed him. Yet he wouldn’t desert the boy. The pair were fiercely loyal.
As the boy watched, one of the windows slid upwards. For some reason it didn’t rise very far. It appeared to have jammed. Or was the opener of the window being cautious? Perhaps afraid that something was amiss?
A hand reached out, then ran from left to right as if checking the window ledge. The woman in white crawled spider-like across the wall to the window and darted at the extended hand.
Sally Wainwright had convinced herself that a piece of newspaper, or something, had become stuck outside her window. It must be flapping in the wind – that was causing the tapping on the pane. So, switching off the light to ensure she didn’t breach blackout regulations, she parted the curtains. Beyond the glass lay the inky totality of night. Not even the cottages over the way were visible. Sally heaved at the sash window. It juddered, creaked; grudgingly, the heavyweight frame slid upwards about four inches, then stopped dead. It probably hadn’t been opened in years. Never mind. This should do. Cold air gusted in. Dozens of feet beneath her lay the hotel yard. Merely the thought of her friends on the roof, just a few hours ago, made her shudder again. They could so easily have fallen to their deaths.
Sally slipped her hand through the gap. The iciness of the stone ledge. Air currents tickled her fingertips. No . . . she couldn’t see any newspaper, or anything that could have caused the tapping on the pane. Maybe a mischievous gull had been to blame? She pushed her hand out further, as far as the bend in her elbow. Nothing but sea air played around her bare fingers.
Wait!
An object softly brushed her exposed flesh. A word flashed through her head: lips. Then: mouth! Before she could even wonder why someone was outside her window, it happened. Sheer agony blasted up her arm. Sally screamed. The pain grew worse, it seemed to set her nerve endings ablaze, and she screamed again.
At the sound of the scream from the next room Beth raced into the corridor. A shaken-looking Alec Reed stumbled, blinking, from the room opposite.
‘Was that you?’ he thundered.
‘It’s Sally. She’s in the room next to mine.’
Before they’d even reached Sally’s door, it flew open and the woman hurled herself from it. Her eyes were wild. For some reason she’d acquired a splash of freckles across her face. Then, to Beth’s horror, she realized those freckles were bright, glistening red.
Sally held her right hand level with her face. ‘They bit me,’ she wailed. ‘Look, I’m bleeding!’
Another figure flew along the corridor, eyes wide, long hair streaming out. ‘What’s happened?’
‘It’s Sally,’ Alec began. ‘She says something bit her.’
‘In her room?’
‘Yes. No.’ The shock had obviously confused Sally. ‘I thought something had got stuck on the window frame. Tap, tap . . . it drove me mad, so I opened the window. I put my hand out to feel . . . Ouch, ouch.’ Tears rolled down her cheek. ‘It really does hurt.’
Eleanor shoulder-charged the door to Sally’s room. Then she went to the window, slammed it down, twisted the lock shut, then closed the curtains.
‘I’m bleeding.’ Sally turned white.
‘My God,’ Alec exclaimed. ‘Blood’s gushing out of the poor girl.’
‘Good!’ was Eleanor’s surprising comment.
Beth told her friend, ‘I’ll get a towel and stop it.’
‘You’ll do no such thing,’ Eleanor snapped. ‘She’s got to bleed it out.’
Alec shook his head. ‘Bleed what out?’
‘Just get her to my room. Quickly.’
‘But I’ve been bitten,’ Sally cried. ‘I’m bleeding to death.’
Eleanor gripped her hand so she could examine the wound. A series of puncture wounds like so ::::
‘Oh, my dear God,’ Eleanor groaned. ‘They have bit her.’ Suddenly, she raged at the top of her voice, ‘After all these years! I thought I’d managed to stop it happening again! It’s my fault! I should have destroyed them! But I couldn’t. I didn’t have the guts . . .’ Her chest heaved with fury.
Sally shrank back in terror. ‘What’s she talking about? And what’s bitten me?’
‘Some animal . . .’ Alec began.
‘No animal,’ Eleanor contradicted. ‘I wish to heaven it were.’
Beth grabbed Sally’s arm. ‘Your brother has the same bite mark. Only his body is covered with them.’
Eleanor seized her long blouse sleeve. ‘And the same as this.’ She yanked back the cuff. The electric light shone down hard on to the wounds there. The same :::: pattern. They resembled tiny, red roses. The edges of the wound could have been miniature petals.
Beth shoved the woman’s arm away. ‘My friend’s gushing blood here. I’m going to stop it.’
‘No, let her bleed.’
Beth put her arm around Sally to guide her to her room.
Eleanor, with formidable strength, grabbed hold of Beth and swung her against the wall. ‘I said: LET HER BLEED!’
‘You’re insane.’
Alec stopped Beth swinging her fists at Eleanor.
‘You want to fight for your friend’s life. Good!’ Eleanor pointed to the staircase at the end of the corridor. ‘Then bring her to my apartment.
I’ve medicine.’
‘Medicine for bites.’ Alec floundered. ‘But you need to staunch the bleeding before she has any drugs.’
‘It’s important to bleed the contagion out first.’
‘Contagion . . .’ Sally crumpled against the wall.
‘I’ve got her,’ Alec assured them as he swept her into his arms.
Beth pleaded, ‘Let me wrap her arm in a towel; she’s losing blood fast.’ Eleanor didn’t answer. She led the way at a run.
Alec nodded after the woman. ‘She seems to know what she’s doing. Trust her.’
In moments, they arrived at Eleanor’s apartment, where she instructed Alec to lay Sally on the dining-room table. Then Eleanor went to work. With swift efficiency, she examined the wound. Blood coursed from the bite marks. It pooled, rich and red, on the wooden table top. ‘Good. This flow is cleaning the wound.’
Cleaning the wound of what, exactly? Beth glanced at Alec and knew he was asking himself the same question.
Eleanor checked Sally’s pulse, then studied the woman’s eyes, as if searching for telltale symptoms.
‘Beth, over there by the tailor’s dummy,’ Eleanor began. ‘You’ll find a clean bed sheet on the shelf. Tear it to pieces – use them as swabs to wipe the table. I need an area clear of blood so I can work on Sally.’
Beth didn’t question the order. Eleanor really did appear to know what she was doing. But what, in God’s name, had bitten not only Sally, but also this enigmatic hotelier and her brother in the past? Lord knew, she craved answers, yet she began shredding the cotton sheet.
‘Alec. Open that cabinet in the corner of the room.’ Eleanor pointed at the tallboy. ‘You’ll see glass jars full of white powder in front of you. Bring one to me.’
He opened the cabinet door to reveal a line of tall jars with glass stoppers. ‘But which one?’
