by Paul Magrs
‘I’m glad you came here. Where things are easier for you. You found your place in the world.’
‘I certainly did. And so did Frank.’
Effie chuckled. ‘You were right mithered when you first had an inkling that he was here, hot on your trail.’
‘I was furious. I was terrified.’
‘You thought it was all some plot to drive you out of your mind, to drive you out of town.’ Effie shook her head, remembering events of just a year ago.
‘And so it was, wasn’t it? In a way. It was all down to that Mrs Claus. She cooked up the whole horrible reunion. Just mixing it. Causing chaos. That’s what she likes to do, the old witch.’
Effie squawked. ‘There’s nothing wrong with witches, I’ll have you know!’
‘You know what I mean. Anyway, it rebounded on her, didn’t it? She never expected Frank and me to get on.’
‘He did try to kill you first, ducky. Remember?’
‘No he didn’t. That was my fault.’ Brenda blew her nose explosively. ‘When we had our reunion out on the sea front, on top of the cliff. He was trying to talk to me, but I was all upset. I kept hitting him. Then we both went over the edge of the cliff and into the sea.’
‘Your fault!’ Effie gasped. She’d been blaming Frank all these months for what befell Brenda on that awful night.
‘I can have quite a temper on me, Effie.’
‘I know! But I do think you might have said that you were the guilty party. I’ve been calling Frank worse than muck for dragging you to your demise that night.’ Then another thought struck Effie. ‘And so it was all down to you that the rest of us had to go down . . . to the whatsit, the underworld, through the Bitch’s Maw, looking for you.’
‘I reckon it was.’ Brenda looked uncomfortable now. ‘I thanked you at the time, though, didn’t I? Anyway, then there was the wedding and everything and, even though I was being coerced into getting wed in order to save your life, and Robert’s, I managed to see Frank for the decent man he is.’
Effie’s eyebrows went up. ‘Decent?’
‘He is, Effie. He’s a good man, really.’
Hmmm, Effie thought. Good, indeed. To her eyes he was a primitive. A rudimentary man. The vague approximation of a human being, thrown together by a lunatic. She looked at Brenda, thinking she would never understand her friend’s feelings. ‘You fell in love with him. Right there and then, on your wedding night?’
‘I suppose I did.’
‘While the rest of us were trying to rescue you! Before the whatsits, the nuptials went off.’
Brenda patted her friend’s bony hand. ‘I was still glad to be rescued and taken home.’
Effie whistled a low note of astonishment as she thought over their lives in recent years. ‘We’ve seen some times, haven’t we?’
‘You can say that again. To hell and back.’
‘We brought your fella out of hell. But we left mine down there still . . .’
Brenda glanced at Effie warily. The subject of Effie’s man friend was usually taboo. ‘You’ve seen or heard nothing more from him since then?’
‘Of course not. Not since his fight with Frank.’
‘Oh dear. I’m sorry about that. Who’d have thought our fellas would have fought like that?’
‘They’re sworn enemies, Brenda!’ Effie rolled her eyes. ‘They’ve always fought, every time they’ve met. They’ve fought for two hundred years or more.’
‘I suppose you’re right.’
Neither of them had noticed the white-coated young man who was standing beside them suddenly. ‘Is it . . . Brenda?’
‘That’s right.’ Brenda jumped out of her plastic chair.
‘What is it, Doctor?’ asked Effie.
The medic gazed at Brenda, his eyes full of concern. ‘Your husband, Frank.’
‘Is he out of danger?’
‘Astonishingly, yes. He was catatonic when he arrived. He remained impervious to all our tests. The nurse broke several needles on him, hooking him up to the drip. To be honest, we haven’t seen anything quite like your husband before.’
Brenda nodded. ‘He’s a one-off.’
‘He’s awake,’ the young doctor said. ‘He came to, only moments ago. He sat up on the bed like someone coming back from the dead. He pushed us all away. He hit one of my nurses. I think she might report him . . .’
‘Where is he now?’ asked Brenda urgently.
‘He was asking for you. In a rather confused way. He’s roaming about belligerently, looking for an exit. I must say, Mrs Brenda, this isn’t what we’re used to at Whitby General. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, he may be concussed. We need to get him calmed down and back to bed.’
Brenda and Effie looked at each other. He was roaming around? What kind of a state was he in? Brenda shook her head confusedly. ‘Oh, Frank won’t be told what to do . . .’
There came a series of terrible noises from behind the swing doors. Brenda recognised Frank’s furious voice, roaring incoherently. Doors smashed and clattered. Female voices – nurses? – wailed in protest as he rampaged. There came the crash and tinkling of glass.
Effie jumped up, clasping her bag. ‘If I’m not mistaken, here he comes now.’ She still remembered what it was like, last time he’d had a turn like this. She had been manhandled by him. He had almost throttled her.
At that moment the swing doors flew open and Frank swayed into the waiting room. His face was snarled up in a rigid mask of fury. He growled like a beast at the sight of the women.
‘Frank!’ the young doctor shouted. ‘Frank, stop that.’
Frank had picked up a waiting room chair and used it to smash the wall-mounted antiseptic gel dispenser. Green jelly went everywhere and Frank snarled in satisfaction.
Brenda stepped forward hesitantly. ‘Frank, love. Come on. Calm down . . . it’s me! Brenda!’
‘Come out of the way, ducky,’ Effie hissed, pulling at her arm. ‘He’s uncontrollable!’
But Brenda wasn’t to be swayed. This was her man. He was suffering somehow. He simply must be, to revert to this terrible, primeval state. She stepped towards him and he gave a warning growl. Brenda cried out. ‘What’s the matter with him, Effie?’ she hissed. ‘It’s like he’s turned back into the savage brute he used to be.’
The medic courageously stepped between the women and the patient. ‘Mr Frank! You must stop this at once!’ He was rewarded for his efforts by a slap from the monster’s pan-shovel hands.
‘Get off him, Frank!’ screeched Effie as Frank took hold of the doctor. He looked ready to rip him in two.
‘Stop this!’ shrieked Brenda. ‘Oh, Frank – you’ll have us all arrested!’
By now, other medical staff were arriving in the waiting room. But there was little they could do to stop him. They managed to bundle the young doctor away. They surrounded Frank. He swayed on the spot and threw back his head, crying out incoherently.
Then he formed the words: ‘Where is she?’
Brenda stood before him. He was talking about her. He couldn’t even see her in the midst of his terrible rage. ‘Frank,’ she said, walking towards him warily, keeping her voice soft, her movements slow.
Frank howled out again. ‘Where is Frank’s woman?’
Brenda spoke up. ‘I’m here! I’m here, Frank!’ Why couldn’t he see her? ‘Calm yourself down.’
‘Frank wants his woman! Where is she?’
Was he blind? Had he really had something horrible in his eye, as Brenda had at first thought?
But no. His jade eyes were open. They were staring and glaring straight at her.
‘Frank, it’s me! Brenda! Stop this! I’m here!’
His face twisted with scorn, and took on an expression of utter disdain. An expression she had never seen him wear before. It cut her to the quick, even before he intoned his next terrible words: ‘You are not woman. Frank doesn’t want you.’
Brenda almost fell over in shock. ‘What?’
He lurched toward
s her, preparing to push her aside. ‘Out of Frank’s way. You are monster. Frank wants woman.’
‘Nooo!’ Brenda crumbled. Effie watched her friend sink to the floor. She hurried to help her as Frank strode past them, through the waiting room.
‘Leave him . . . come away, Brenda.’ She guided her friend to a chair. ‘He’s gone berserk.’
Before he slammed out of the waiting room and the reception area, Frank roared again. It was a terrible, animalistic cry of desire. His words rang out under the bleak strip-lighting: ‘Frank wants . . . Karla!’
Brenda lifted her head. Her face was wet with hot tears. ‘What did he say, Effie? Did I hear right?’
There was another crash as Frank stormed through the automatic doors of A&E. Now he was out in the night and the staff were glad to see him go.
Brenda looked at Effie. ‘Did he say what I thought he said?’
Effie’s expression was very dark. ‘I’m afraid he did, Brenda.’
Brenda broke down into hopeless sobs.
Parcel of Doom
Most mornings the Christmas Hotel required a separate visit from the post van. Stood to reason, really, with so many long-term residents of the elderly kind, with relatives scattered all over the country and wanting to stay in touch. Also, Mrs Claus tended to order in her supplies of festive decorations through the mail.
The post van would pull up at the back of the hotel on the Royal Crescent not long before eight most mornings. Bobby was their usual postman, a hirsute man in his forties who had been postie here almost all of his working life. He knew the staff at Mrs Claus’s establishment and took it for granted now, when he heaved the sacks of mail into the building, that there’d be carols and tinsel and a general air of festivity. It gave him a boost, most mornings, all through the year, to get a little bit of Christmas at about ten to eight.
What he enjoyed most, though, was sitting in the main kitchen for five minutes, to have a cup of hot, strong coffee and a nibble on a fried egg sandwich. This was his routine, mostly unbroken, for years. The women in charge of the kitchens seemed to enjoy his company. Even the hard-working elves did. Certainly, Mrs Brick, the stooped and rather leathery head cook, liked to see him each morning. It was as if Bobby was bringing a little taste of the outside world into their existence. To him, it was as if the staff of the Christmas Hotel existed inside a bubble, quite apart from the real world. A glass bauble – that was what it was. Shiny and glittering.
Today he was frozen when he came into the kitchen. Mrs Brick urged him to get his coffee down first, then come and sit by the range, before he told her all the gossip. First of all he told her how he’d had to make a big detour from his usual route around the eastern part of town. A whole street – Silver Street – had been roped off. At first he had assumed there’d been a ghastly accident. Or maybe a homicide or something. But then he saw the vans and the lights. They weren’t the kind of thing police would use.
‘What were it, then, Bobby?’ Mrs Brick brought him his plate of egg sandwiches and he inhaled their heavenly scent with a grin.
‘Film people!’ he said. ‘They’ve started work. They must have been up since the crack of dawn. I couldn’t see many people about, or what they were doing, but they look ready to roll.’
Mrs Brick pulled a nasty face. ‘I don’t agree with it. Films like that. They’re mucky films, aren’t they? The ones that that floozy stars in.’
‘Oh yes.’ Bobby smiled happily. ‘I’ve seen them all. Mucky as owt. She gets her whatsits out at every opportunity.’
Mrs Brick tutted. ‘And to think – she’s up there in our very best suite!’ She lowered her voice. ‘And word has it she’s got her hands on one of our elves. He went up to give her something, and he’s never been seen since.’
Bobby raised his eyebrows as he sank his teeth into the thick doorstop bread and the hot slippery egg. ‘She’s seduced an elf ?’
‘I’ll say.’ Mrs Brick tapped her nose. ‘Awful business. Kevin it were. I’d have thought better of him.’
‘I wonder if she’ll be out on location today, then,’ Bobby mused. ‘She’ll gather quite a crowd, I reckon, when Whitby wakes up and sees that they’ve starting shooting.’
‘I don’t like films much,’ Mrs Brick sighed. ‘Especially not that sort. All I need is my Bible to read at night. I don’t need any other form of entertainment.’
Bobby nodded. Sometimes the old woman could be so boring. But it was worth keeping in with her, just for the breakfast baps. ‘Speaking of Karla Sorenson,’ he said, through a delicious mouthful, ‘there’s a parcel come for her. It’s in my sack with the rest of the stuff. Here, pass it over . . .’
Mrs Brick did as he asked, a fastidious look on her face. The box was quite large, done up in old-fashioned brown paper and string. A label on its top said simply:Ms Karla Sorenson
The Christmas Hotel
Whitby
‘Heavy.’ Mrs Brick frowned, looking at the parcel as if she could barely imagine what kind of obscene object it might contain. Bobby took it and shook it close to his ear, careful not to smear the paper with greasy finger marks.
‘It rattles,’ he said. ‘It makes a strange kind of noise, if you put it up to your ear.’ He held it up for Mrs Brick to listen to, which she did, briefly.
‘I don’t like it,’ she said. ‘Whatever’s in it, it’s . . . horrible.’ She took an involuntary step backwards.
Bobby nodded. ‘That was my feeling exactly. When I picked up the sacks this morning at the depot. They’d just come from the station. They were sitting there as usual. This was on the top, waiting for me, with the rest of the stuff. And it just seemed to be . . . emanating.’
‘Emanating?’ Mrs Brick rolled the word around in her mouth, as if she had never heard it before.
‘Evil,’ said Bobby. ‘That’s what it is. There’s something evil inside of it.’
Mrs Brick jumped, realising that he had put the thing down on her scrubbed table. ‘Get it off there. I don’t want it in my kitchen. Take it to her. That devil woman in her turret! I don’t want to know anything more about it.’
‘Should I?’ Bobby said wonderingly. Usually the hand delivery of individual letters and parcels within the hotel would be left to the elvish staff. But . . . this was a unique opportunity, wasn’t it? This would never happen again. Not to Bobby.
Mrs Brick watched his eyes light up. ‘I wouldn’t go anywhere near that woman,’ she warned. ‘Look what happened when she lip-synched last night in the ballroom.’
Bobby blinked at her. He hadn’t heard the tale yet. ‘What?’
‘Bloke had a funny turn. Big bloke. That Brenda’s bloke. Had a seizure right there on the dance floor.’
‘How could that be Karla’s fault?’ Bobby tried to laugh it off. But that was exactly the kind of thing that happened in the films Karla starred in. The vampire lady could cause all sorts of chaos with just one bat of her eyelashes. He picked up the parcel. ‘Would anyone mind if I went up there? Gave it to her in person?’
Mrs Brick glared at him as he dabbed his napkin to his greasy lips. ‘I’m warning you,’ she whispered. ‘Nothing good will come of this.’
Bobby shrugged and hurried out of the kitchen and into the interior of the hotel, keeping away from the public areas. For some reason he didn’t want anyone to see him. What was he doing? Nothing illicit. If challenged, he could just say that he had instructions to deliver a precious cargo to Ms Sorenson herself. Nothing dodgy about that. He paused by the back stairs and the staff lift, examining a diagram that would show him how to get to the suite in the turret. The fanciest set of rooms in the whole Christmas Hotel.
Bobby clutched the parcel nervously all the way up in the private lift. Checking himself out in the gilded mirrors. He was really going to see her. In the actual flesh.
When the doors opened, there was a young man standing there in a white bathrobe, looking rumpled and cross. Presumably Kevin. The postman calmed his nerves. Why was he so nervous? ‘
I-I’ve got a parcel I have to deliver to Ms Sorenson herself,’ he stammered.
‘You can give it to me,’ Kevin said. ‘I’ll sign for it.’
‘It has to be into her own hands.’
Kevin frowned. ‘She’s still in bed.’
Was it Bobby’s imagination? The parcel seemed to . . . crackle under his palms. Maybe it was a static charge from the plush carpets. Or the string was twisting under his fingers. The box seemed to tingle urgently. Like a phone set to vibrate.
A voice – smoky, alluring – drifted into the hall from the next room. ‘Oh, I’ll sign it for him, Kevin, whatever it is. Is he sexy?’
Kevin looked him up and down. ‘He’s got a pretty big package with him, put it that way.’
Karla hooted with laughter. ‘Then show him through!’
Bobby couldn’t say a single thing in reply. His throat was jammed tight with fear. He took shambling footsteps down the opulent hallway, to the boudoir of . . .
Of doom, he thought. The Boudoir of Doom!
Now, why am I thinking that? They don’t mean me any harm, do they? Surely not . . .
Penny’s Qualms
Dear Mam,
You’re going to think I’ve got myself involved with a right bunch here. I don’t know if I dare tell you the kind of things that have been happening. Will you even believe me?
It’s early morning at the Hotel Miramar. I’m due on duty in about an hour, and I’ve hardly slept at all. It’s been a rough night and my head’s spinning around with all this stuff. I’ve come for a sit outside, where it’s bright and quiet and the sea air is fresh . . . I’m hoping it’ll blow away some of the cobwebs. My head feels thick with them.
I feel like I’m in a fairy tale. It wouldn’t be so bad, all the weird stuff that’s been going on, if I hadn’t seen the flying settee as well.
Oh, you’ll think I’m rambling and making daft stuff up. But it’s true, Mam! When I couldn’t sleep in the middle of the night, I went to my bedroom window to look at the moon – full and huge over the headland. And I saw a settee floating about, rising above the rooftops of the town. Two figures were sitting on it, like it was the most normal thing in the world. It felt like a dream. It disappeared behind a bank of woolly purple cloud and for a moment I was wondering whether I had imagined it. I mean, a floating sofa?
