London Under Midnight

by Simon Clark

  In the lounge Trajan groaned with both the pain in his head and the pain of losing April. Ben wanted to not only groan but snarl with anger as he remembered that carefree spell when he'd meet up with April three or four times a week. There were no pressures. They enjoyed meals together or visited pubs with friends. When he thought of her he saw that smile that seemed to permanently light up her face. Each time they met she was overjoyed at seeing him again. It was as if she'd missed him desperately, and all the time he took her lovely smile for granted. That's what he wanted to see now - the whole portfolio of smiles; the pleased-to-see-you smile; the smile as they laughed their way along the streets; the parting smile followed by a kiss on the cheek when they went their separate ways at the evening's end. Dear God. Back then he only had to call her. 'Fancy seeing that new film tonight?' Or: 'I've found this Greek restaurant just off Oxford Street. Feeling hungry?' He only had to ask her to meet him. The reply was always 'Yes!' Those weeks were filled with April's smiling face. He only had to stroll along Charing Cross Road and he'd bump into her as she hurried along, hugging document files to her chest. For three months April was everywhere. Sometimes he didn't have to lift a finger; a tap at the office door and there she would be. 'I was just passing with Jeff and Katrice and I thought I'd stick my nose round the door. Fancy a coffee?' Yes, a thousand times yes. Then he had to take that trip to New York. It was going to be little more than a few days. Even when the magazine there asked him to stay on for a while he took it for granted that he'd return to that social whirl with April happily at its centre. Only life back in London moved on. Ties got cut. He lost touch.

  'Idiot,' he fumed.

  As he crossed the floor to the boiling kettle he noticed Trajan stood in the kitchen doorway. His red-rimmed eyes fixed on him. He said nothing, merely stared like he'd never seen a guy make coffee before.

  Ben paused. 'Are you feeling okay?'

  Trajan glared. 'That night we met you on the embankment. It wasn't you who followed us and attacked us, was it?'

  'You are joking?'

  'Christ! You know I'm not bloody joking!' He slammed his fist against the door. 'You had the opportunity. Now with this past you had with April, how do I know you didn't have a motive?'

  'The only "past" was friendship… platonic, no-sex friendship. Got that?'

  Trajan pressed his lips together as a wave of pain surged through him. 'I've got to ask. The police are doing nothing, are they? They think this is just a tiff and she's jumped into bed with another man.' He pressed his hand to his temple.

  'Did they give you painkillers?'

  'I can't take those.'

  'Why not? You clearly need them.'

  'What I clearly need is to find April because nobody else is looking.'

  Ben spoke calmly, 'I will.'

  'What?'

  'I'll look for her.'

  'Why?'

  'Damn it, Trajan. She's a mate, a pal, the best bloody friend a man can have.'

  'I lost my memory,' he said. 'Same might have happened to her. We should visit the hospitals, ask if anyone's been admitted with amnesia, and we'll get posters copied with her photograph.' The guy was close to collapse. 'Another thing. You were close by. Did you see anyone that looked… I can't describe it, but there was something pumped about them. Too big; something out of proportion. You know?'

  'Trajan, sit down. I'll bring the coffee through then we can talk.'

  'I can talk right here.'

  'You look as if you're going to fall down, never mind talk.'

  The wounded man tottered back to the sofa.

  'Where did you put the painkillers?' Ben asked as he brought in the coffee.

  'I'm not having pills. I need to stay focused.'

  'You're not focused, pal. You're in agony.'

  'I'm fine.'

  'You're nowhere near fine. If you take some painkillers they'll relax you.'

  'Good God, I don't want to be relaxed. I should be out looking for April.'

  'You left the door open in case she just strolled back in, didn't you? Let's face it, that's as unlikely as you searching every street in London single-handed.'

  Again Trajan repeated, 'I'm fine.'

  'I'm going to get the painkillers. You're going to swallow them. Look, Trajan, if you're relaxed you might start to remember.' He took a deep breath. 'What you said, when you nearly rammed me through the wall, suggests that somewhere deep inside your head is the memory of what happened to you. If we can coax that out it's a start.'

  Trajan grimaced. 'Ben. My big sister is just about as bossy as you.' He gave a tired smile. 'Okay, painkillers, hypnotism, torture. I'll submit to anything as long as it brings April back.'

  Ben nodded. 'Me too.'

  FIFTEEN

  The tide that sweeps up the River Thames is a colossal, fast moving pulse of water comprising billions of gallons. This time, in its cold grip, it carried April Connor. The white heat of hunger wouldn't allow her to consider her situation, or the radical departure from her old life, or even the fundamental questions.

  What had happened to her, exactly, when that monstrous figure attacked her on the embankment just a few nights ago? How come she hadn't drowned after he'd thrown her into the river? Why did she shrink from sunlight? Why were there people with those same bite marks marooned on the island? What made them insane with hunger? Why did she have no heartbeat?

  If Carter Vaughn had risen out of the depths and grabbed her by the shoulders as she floated there, as inert as a log beneath London Bridge, and uttered the words: 'We are vampires now', she wouldn't have been able to digest the statement. And if at that moment she looked into Carter's face with those soulful eyes that were full of compassion she would have only seen the veins lying just below the skin. Her entire being would have focused on the blood oozing through them. The rest of his flesh and his skeleton would have been nothing compared to the infinitely complex structure of capillaries, veins and arteries - all those beautiful vessels that transmitted the blood through his body.

  For the first time in days April felt excitement buzz through her nerves. Here she was floating in the muddy water. If anyone had glanced down from the bridge they would have thought they saw some debris forming a blurred shape just below the surface. They wouldn't have seen an eager face and wide, staring eyes. But the warm-blooded men and women that teemed in those streets just yards from her made their presence felt. She could almost smell the blood in their veins. Smell? No, correction, she could almost taste it.

  ***

  In the Bloomsbury apartment Ben's attention alternated between the television news channel - no mention of April Connor yet - and the evening skyline. All day, showers had swept across the towering buildings. There was an impression in the air that some hostile force gathered just beyond sight over the horizon. The tension infiltrated the streets to tighten the nerves of the population. Every few minutes a police siren would make its howling presence felt. A little while ago Ben had looked out the window to see three youths pounce on another youth. When they knocked him to the ground they started kicking his head. Then, as quickly as it began, it was over. A pair of kids joined the fight. The victim on the ground leapt to his feet as if a spell of invincibility had been cast. He and his friends then began pounding his attackers with their fists. A man passing by with a dog yelled at the teen warriors to cool it. The hefty, black mongrel had lurched forward, its jaws snapping at the kids. As if some force exploded the fighters they all ran off in different directions, darting away between cars. The man who'd intervened bent down to soothe the dog who was still barking. The moment he touched the bristling fur on its back the mutt swung its head round and sank its canines into its owner's hand.

  From up here on the fourth floor Ben heard the man cursing. A moment later he disappeared into a side street; he was still haranguing his dog while he nursed the bitten limb beneath his armpit.

  Ben turned back to the TV just as a shout came from the bedroom. Trajan had managed to get himself the
re after taking the powerful painkillers. The guy must have been operating on will power alone; even the pain had helped him stay awake, but once the analgesics worked their narcotic magic he'd simply shut down. For the last six hours he'd slept soundly. But now this… Ben expected the man to be hammering at the wall. Instead he found Trajan to still be asleep; however, he fidgeted, and a muttering bubbled out of his throat. As Ben watched the man convulsed on the bed.

  'Don't hurt her… why'd you bite her?'

  'Trajan!'

  The muttering stopped. The blond head turned on the pillow. A moment later the rhythmic breathing had returned.

  Again, conflicting emotions gripped Ben. Here was a guy who was enduring an ordeal. His scalp had been split by what must have been hell of a blow; much worse, the woman he loved had vanished. On top of that he found the police weren't convinced by his story. If anything, they suspected that an infuriated girlfriend had brained him with the rolling pin or whatever, then scooted.

  Ben Ashton felt a surge of sympathy for the guy. Yet that green-eyed jealousy demon wouldn't leave him be. Yes, there's the injured victim who's lost his fiancee. But just look at him. He's lying on the king-size bed where he made love to April - the woman that Ben loved. Secretly loved. Insanely loved. Because he'd left it far too late. When he could have revealed his feelings to her he didn't. Too bloody late by far. Ben whirled away to return to the lounge. There he sat with his chin in both hands as he stared at the television. The parents of a missing man, a care-worker by the name of Carter Vaughn, were making an appeal for the public's help in finding him. They held up a photograph of a good-looking, dark-skinned man with distinctive gold-tipped teeth.

  'Please,' the mother was saying, 'can anyone out there help find our son?'

  ***

  At the same time as Ben Ashton watched the parents of Carter Vaughn make their plea, April Connor lay in the river's shallows beneath an overhanging concrete platform. Here she was invisible to people passing along the edge of the river. The buildings across the water were gloomy tombstone shapes in the dusk. She raised herself on one elbow as a passenger ferry droned upstream; the wash from its bows ran out in a curl of white foam that splashed against her chest as it arrived with a hissing noise beneath the canopy. She gazed up at the projecting lip of concrete that extended some ten feet over the edge of the water. Her sensitive nostrils caught the scent of warm bodies close by. Perhaps there was a path which led to a riverside restaurant? There were odours of cooking food. Oddly those didn't interest her. It was the thought of all those men and women that made the hunger blaze inside her. The tide still hadn't risen to its highest point yet and the swell of the river nudged her shoreward as if to say, 'You've made it, April. You're here. Now… just a little further… a little more…'

  A sudden swirl of water disturbed the part-enclosed space - with the canopy above and the stone wall of the embankment. She looked to her right as a figure moved out of the shallows and on to the bank of sand that the tide had piled against the wall. The shadowy figure emerged, pulling itself with its arms and dragging its legs behind. To April, it appeared as if something part human, part alligator had dragged its sinuous body from the water on to the hidden beach. It happened again. A second shadowy figure hauled itself on to the sand, belly down, as if its legs no longer worked. When they reached the wall they turned to sit with their backs to the stonework. In the twilight they stared at her; their expressions were impassive but their eyes blazed as if they expected a momentous event to occur soon. One of the figures opened its mouth. She saw yellow glints on the tips of the teeth.

  Carter… At that moment she appeared to be in a state of half-life. She couldn't speak, or even think clearly, but deep down she recognized one of her own kind. The movement came as an automatic response, as a dog salivates at the sight of food, but a second later she emerged from the water, employing that same alligator-like motion. Without standing she dragged herself across the sand to the wall. Without uttering a word, or giving a sign that she'd seen her new companions, she turned herself round and sat with the vertical hardness against her back. She waited as the night slowly fell on London.

  ***

  Between the end of the afternoon matinee and the evening performance is a wasteland of three hours. There's not enough time to go home; there's only so much shopping can be done and still conserve energy for the evening show. Irving Browning, who played the clown character, Tito, in the stage version of Laugh, Clown, Laugh, had an additional problem. The elaborate clown make-up consisted of daubing his face white, then painting oversize lips that rose at each end into a frozen grin. Add to that black wedges drawn on the sides of his eyes, which radiated outwards to create the effect of perpetual astonishment for the audience. All in all, it took an hour to apply the theatrical paint before a show and thirty minutes to remove it afterwards, so there was simply no point in scraping it off his face after the matinee in order to reapply it for the evening performance.

  'That's the price an actor pays for their art,' he murmured into the mirror at his clown reflection. He checked the made-up nose. In honour of staying true to the Lon Chaney silent movie, that classic of 1928 where the genius actor played a famous clown who couldn't stop weeping, he rejected the customary red nose in favor of a white nose, which had its origins with the harlequin tradition of Renaissance Italy. Over his elaborate costume, with its diamond pattern of silver and red, he wore an old white lab coat to protect it as he worked in the cellar of the theatre. From clown to Phantom of the Opera. The transformation appealed to the dramatic nature of his soul. Irving Browning whiled away that divide between matinee and evening performance in his own private world, building a circus for his grandson who'd been born four months ago. For Tod's first Christmas he decided to create something that the boy could keep forever. Yesterday he'd finished painting the circus elephants and done more work on the big top. The rigging was giving some trouble as guy ropes couldn't be fixed to the ground like a real tent. Instead his circus tent had a wire hoop sewn into the lining where the roof met the walls, and then a second hoop where the canvas walls would meet the floor. The entire structure would be three feet high by over four feet wide. Plenty of room for lions and their tamers, trapeze artists, the strongman and his girl, plus the red-coated ringmaster, of course. This afternoon he wanted to pay close attention to one of the clowns. Irving had decided to paint the clown to resemble himself; a novel memento of the boy's actor grandfather.

  Unlike the sad clown he portrayed in the play Irving Browning was a happy clown. He didn't return to his dressing room in his surreal harlequin make-up to brood darkly on the futility of existence over a bottle of vodka, instead he joked with the other actors to release after-show tensions, and likely as not, he soon had them singing the theme songs from popular TV shows.

  This afternoon he had his workshop in the theatre's basement to himself. So that left Irving to paint the circus characters to this heart's content. His own smile matched his painted clown smile as he pictured the expression on his grandson's face as he revealed the splendour of the circus on Christmas Day.

  That vault beneath the eighteenth-century theatre tended toward stuffiness. Often it smelt of the paints and adhesives he used in constructing the circus; then there might be the whiff of varnish from a new theatrical prop. Always there was the dust smell from old sets stacked away in the corners, and the boxes that contained costumes from bygone productions. This afternoon, however, there was a flow of cold air through the place. In all the months he'd been down here, even in the depths of winter, it never felt as chilly as this. He sniffed the air. It had a whiff of river water. And although the theatre was barely a mile from the Thames, it was still unusual to smell it down here.

  'Hello?' His voice echoed away amongst the flats that represented a Scottish castle. He listened hard; he thought he'd heard movement, which had been enough to prompt the hello. 'Enter if you are beautiful and unattached,' he declared in his grand, thespian tones. Usually the
staff or cast member would make some suitably light-hearted comment. But after that earlier sound there was only silence. Only… Only that gust of cold air had intensified. He shivered then blew into his hands.

  'Close the door, dear heart,' he boomed in fruity tones. 'It's cold as the grave down here… and Irving Browning isn't getting a day younger, don't cha know?' With that he returned to painting the clown's scarlet smile, but what he heard next startled him so much he jerked the brush and slashed the paint across the figure's throat. 'Silly beggar.' He shouted the words as an act of defiance because the sound rattled his nerves. Dear God, he thought, it sounded like an entire scrapyard had smashed into the place.

  He set the brush and figure down and went to investigate. The noise had been a thunderous clang. Clearly a huge chunk of iron had fallen; for the life of him he couldn't imagine what that would be. The scenery flats stored down here were light timber frames with canvas stretched over them. Of course, there was so much stored down here it formed stacks that touched the ceiling so he had to work his way through a maze of canyons, where he could see no more than a few feet ahead at any one time. He glanced at the electric lights set in the ceiling. The force of whatever had fallen had raised so much dust it formed a yellow mist. His nose began to tickle but he resisted wiping it. To do so would smudge his clown makeup, and as a professional that just wasn't the done thing.

  He did his best to walk in the direction from where the cold breeze blew, because that, he guessed, must be connected somehow with that metallic crash. The stacks of old scenery meant that it wasn't possible to head directly to it, although he sensed he was heading in the right direction - toward the back of the vault where broken chairs and redundant props were dumped. At that moment a figure emerged from the shadows.