‘Yeah, I realise that. Alex, I’m sorry.’
‘Yes, you said. Does that mean you’ll be telling your friends at The Grapevine that I’m not a sexual predator, drug dealer, stalker, and whatever else he said?’
‘Hey, I never told anyone you–’ He paused, seeing the knowledge of it written across my face. ‘I’m sorry. I can’t believe I let him convince me,’ he sighed, squeezing his temples. ‘I was just so disappointed after hearing it, right before meeting up with you again. The truth is I didn’t sign up to that dating agency. One of my mates did it for a laugh, and I felt bad so I went along with it. But then I found you were different. I’ve been on so many dates with girls who turned out to be, well, not very ladylike.’
‘Mark, can I give you some advice?’
‘Sure.’
‘You can’t expect any woman to be a lady if you’re not being a gentleman, and vice versa.’
‘Yeah. I really messed it up.’
He went on apologising and it wasn’t difficult to feel bad for him. Perhaps he couldn’t help lacking the capacity to think for himself. Owen had after all dragged him into something ugly and maybe he just didn’t know any better. Nevertheless, it was impossible to let that faze me in being straight with him.
‘Well, it’s late and I need to get going,’ I stated.
‘Are you driving?’
‘No. I’m getting the bus tonight.’
‘Can I give you a lift home?’ On seeing my face ready to decline he immediately added, ‘You only live a few streets from me, remember? You’ll be home faster and safer. No strings of course! It only makes sense since I’m going that way.’
I’m sure it did make sense to him if he thought I might buckle and give him another chance. Although I’m all for second chances, I no longer liked him in that way. It was true though that geographically it did make sense. I would only agree after making it perfectly clear that friendship was all I had to offer.
He waited for me to lock up. As we left and entered upon the pathway towards the car park I realised I’d forgotten my scarf. I asked him to wait while I went back for it. My eyes darted up to the mullioned window on the first floor landing. I caught a glimpse of a figure in it, which moved away as I looked. Was the light from the streetlamp bouncing off the glass, creating shadows as I moved?
When I returned with my scarf in hand, Mark lingered on the path waiting for me. ‘Ready?’ he said cheerfully. I nodded and we walked to the deserted car park, save for his white VW Golf. It was parked facing the house in view of the main entrance. He followed me round to the passenger side to open my door. He just had to push it a bit further.
‘Thanks,’ I said, indifferently, climbing in. I couldn’t afford to give him any encouragement, though I appreciated not having to get the bus home. While he went round to his side, I put on my seatbelt. Looking up I noticed that figure in the window again; it solidified. I had a clearer view from here. It was more salient now at this distance with no direct light from the lamps dancing off the glass at this angle. I felt as if it stared at me, though I couldn’t make out any features. The shape of the silhouette was familiar, a recognizable height and breadth. I felt certain it was Thom.
Ten
THE STRANGER
‘And from the shaft rose smoke like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke from the shaft.’
– Revelations 9:2
I opened my curtains to find the sky like steel, matching my mood. The jeep sat outside. I’d had a text from Adrian saying I could have it all day since he’d be working late at the theatre. This lifted my spirits; I could drive to New Cromley and avoid getting wet.
I drank my coffee down thirstily despite the heat while mulling over the lift home last night. Mark had resumed being the happy man I first met, chatting and giving me plenty of eye contact. It wasn’t hard to see why I had liked him in the first place. Then he had the nerve to tell me what an impression I’d made on him by not begging for another chance after the way he treated me.
He pulled up at the end of my driveway and I climbed straight out while thanking him for the lift.
‘Hey,’ he said, muting the engine before walking round to the pavement. He stopped in front of me. ‘A few of us are joining a charity walk this weekend. It’s three miles but for a good cause. Do you fancy coming along? Could be a laugh.’
‘That’s a nice offer, but–’
‘We could get to know each other again,’ he added.
‘I’m just going to say no thanks.’
I felt completely stupid and ungrateful because I’d probably end up staying in all weekend, moaning later that I never get invitations like this. But I no longer liked him in that way. I realised I should have never accepted a lift; I began to feel as though I had teased him.
‘You could do a lot worse than me, Alex,’ he said in frustration.
‘No doubt, but that’s not really a good enough reason for me to date someone. Thank you for the lift, Mark. Take care of yourself.’ I walked across my driveway. Despite his audacity, I felt awful for letting him drive me home in the first place.
That night I had the strangest dream. I was starving hungry and a shadow came towards me that I felt was Thom, though I couldn’t see his face. He offered me exactly twelve pomegranate seeds to eat. I hesitated to take them and at the same time felt compelled to. It made me realise how much I looked forward to work at the Cray on Saturday.
On that said day I overslept and had to rush to get there by bus. It was foggier than ever I’d seen it. A thick white vapour practically poured over the threshold. I noted the time; I was ten minutes late. I hurried round the desk hoping I’d gotten away with it. The moment I sat on the chair, Mrs Evans appeared, as if the seat was a button that projected her forth. Her eyes fell on me briefly as she took her cigarettes out of her bag and made her way to the door unsuspecting. She paused at the desk and pondered a moment.
‘Alex, you know that Stacey has called in sick? Has she said anything to you about not coming in?’ Her tone was anxious as she drummed her fingernails on the half-empty cigarette box.
I shook my head.
‘And nothing I suppose about whether – well, I mean when – she might come back? Nothing’s upset her?’
‘I haven’t spoken to her. Is she ill?’
‘She says she has flu’ – she pulled a face – ‘as if the common cold isn’t so common anymore. Perhaps it doesn’t exist. There’s only common flu.’
‘Maybe it’s best she gets rid of those germs before coming back?’
‘As long as she does come back! I don’t want any more sudden leavers.’
She looked away vexed before trotting outside for her smoke. I wondered if Stacey was pulling a sickie, and if Mrs Evans suspected that. Although her concern seemed more for whether or not she would come back at all. Despite being unhappy with Stacey for telling Mark where I worked, I sent her a text asking how she was. I would probably get into trouble if Mrs Evans caught me texting at the desk, so I kept an eye on her outside. She stood at the doorway blowing her smoke into the fog. A man lingered out there on the pathway. I could just about make him out as he stood looking up at the house. He wasn’t tall, but what he lacked in height he made up for in width. From this angle, his large rounded belly stuck out, resembling a pregnancy bump of the third trimester. The long dark coat he wore made it all the more prominent. This fell to his ankles and clearly wouldn’t do up around his middle. In place of a neck, he had a large double chin, which perhaps would’ve fallen into several layers if it weren’t so thick. His complexion was of a dark yellow, almost sickly colouring. Something rang strange about him and the mirthless look upon his face. Mrs Evans moved towards him, holding her cigarette down at her side as if trying to hide it.
‘Do you need any help?’ she asked in her telephone voice. ‘You look lost.’
‘I’m looking for Halton Cray,’ said the stranger in an incredibly flat tone, and with an Ameri
can accent. An accent I’d never heard in real life before, but only in movies and TV shows like Friends.
‘You’re in it,’ Mrs Evans replied, wide-eyed, in a manner that this was obvious.
His head tilted forward as she spoke, his bug-like eyes drawing up to look at her. It changed my view of his face. I saw the very large sockets carved in his skull beneath a stretched inflamed skin that orbed them. His eyes were a deep dirty brown colour, the kind of colour you only find on autumn days in gutters and muddy rivers.
‘There’s some maps of the grounds just inside if you need any directions,’ Mrs Evans added.
I expected her to continue the conversation – perhaps ask him where he was from or something – but she didn’t. She took one last long drag of her cigarette before putting it out under her foot and collecting the butt in her hand. The man turned away without answering her, and like a walking corpse in a zombie film, he disappeared into the fog. Mrs Evans slipped back inside the main door.
‘Oh, I don’t like the look of him!’ she whispered across the desk to me, turning quickly to ascertain he wasn’t behind her. ‘He’s got the look of a serial killer! The blood in my veins’ – she stretched out her wrists to show me – ‘turned positively ice cold, and I felt a shiver down my spine sharp as knives. I’ve got a sixth sense for that sort, like that–’ She cut off, and after a pause continued. ‘It looked like there was no one living in there!’ She tapped her temple. ‘You know, the lights are on but no one’s home. But not in a stupid way, more a menacing way.’
I didn’t respond to this but gazed back at her a little perplexed. She’d never spoken to me quite like this before, and seemed to have mistaken me for Stacey. I saw her eyes widen as she realised how she’d come across – as if ignorant that I knew what she was.
‘But I don’t like to judge,’ she added, softening her tone. ‘It’s just such a ghastly looking scene out there today, like a horror tale. I wasn’t being nasty. He was just very strange, you know.’
In fairness to her, on this occasion, I didn’t like the look of him myself and would not have chosen to talk to him at all.
She soon directed me to work in the shop, which was disappointing. The post was just arriving and I still wanted to make that extra effort with Thom. Being in the shop would give me fewer opportunities; he never came in there.
When I took my break and made my way to the staffroom, I noticed through the window and across the courtyard one of the outer doors swing violently open, like it might come off its hinges. It gave me déjà vu. I was both surprised and happy when Thom appeared there, crossing the small alley and entering through the door opposite. This door then suffered the same blow. He was now on my side of the building. Instinctively my eyes followed him through the glass as he whirled the corner like a tempest, and headed along the next corridor in my direction. Two female visitors near me also took note of him. He wasn’t walking fast yet he moved with a determination to get somewhere. Jacketless, he wore a pale pinstriped shirt with the sleeves rolled up. I wondered how he could stand the November cold. His head was down with those dark orbs of his fixed to the floor, and his mop of cola-black hair grazing his forehead, just touching his eyebrows. His eyes shot up, abruptly landing on mine. They fiercely held me in a gaze. I caught sight of the women as they shuddered and moved slightly to one side, towards a floor length curtain. He turned into the De Morgan Gallery and the women hurried back the way they came.
‘What’s the matter with him?’ I mumbled, about to launch myself in there to find out.
‘Alex?’ Mrs Evans’s voice stopped me. She called from behind having opened the staffroom door. ‘It’s your break now, I think.’
I followed her back in. I was still curious and eager to make an effort with him, but I resolved that now wasn’t perhaps the best time. In the staffroom, Frances and Geoffrey were musing over the local paper.
‘Oh that’s just awful!’ Frances exclaimed, lifting her head as I walked in. She proceeded to catch me up on what they’d been reading. ‘Morning, Alex. Oh, that storm did some damage the other night! A poor man was killed over in St. Martins Woods.’
I took a seat next to her. ‘What happened?’
‘Lightning struck a tree and one of its boughs fell on him. It hit him on the head and killed him.’
‘That’s not what killed him!’ Mrs Evans broke in, licking her lips as she took up the paper and held it close to her face. ‘Listen to this: “Though it’s confirmed that lightning struck the tree, which severed a branch and fractured the man’s skull, a preliminary post-mortem examination proved inconclusive that the man, who is yet to be identified, died as a result. The man, thought to be in his mid-thirties, suffered extreme blood loss leading to hypovolemic shock, which is typically seen with high-voltage injuries. However, it’s confirmed that the man did not receive a direct strike and may have died moments before sustaining the skull fracture. Further tests are being carried out but his death is not thought to be suspicious.”
‘Well, what do you make of that?’ she said, laying the paper out on the table. ‘Bled to death by lightning!’
Geoffrey shook his head, giving the slightest of sighs. ‘Not quite, Doreen. An electrical charge of some magnitude is capable of burning the blood vessels so that they leak excessive amounts of plasma. That is what they might be referring to when they say blood loss. They may just be referring to blood volume.’
‘But it says the lightning didn’t strike him!’ She pointed to the newspaper. ‘It’s all very suspicious if you ask me.’
Geoffrey shook his head slowly and finished his tea, before getting up and making his way to the door.
‘He must be a local man,’ Frances remarked, ‘if he was in those woods during that storm.’ She took her empty teacup to the sink to rinse it. ‘Someone will come forward to identify him, surely.’
I glanced over the article myself remembering how I’d sat at my bedroom window that night. Mrs Evans continued surmising how he’d died, and not getting much response from Frances, or me, she took up the newspaper again to peruse the next page.
The shop got busier and I was glad Mrs Evans noticed how overrun it had been. Though a little reluctantly, she promised me the front desk for the rest of the afternoon.
It looked cold out but I was in need of fresh air. So despite the fog I went for a walk at lunch. Crossing the bridge and weir to the rear of the stables, I wandered across to Spring Meadow where the ghostly trees were dripping in dew. Their leafless branches hung over the pond and rockery like limp demonic fingers. They webbed my view of the mausoleum, which interred the last Sir Halton Cray, his wife, their sons and ancestors. It looked like any other large stone crypt you’d find in a necropolis, only it was in the middle of a damp meadow, misty and secluded. Crows, those harbingers of death, circled it, laughing as they do psychotically, clinging to the decay within its walls for some unknown purpose. A scene for some ‘building to’ moment was set for a horror movie not yet complete. And there stood that sallow-skinned stranger just across the pond from where I walked; an equal distance between the mausoleum and me.
I stopped to observe what he was doing. The mud-eyed and bloated creature stood slightly obscured from the house by an obliging tree. Perhaps only his stomach gave him away from the other side, from the house he was clearly watching. Even as I walked on a few paces, breaking cornflake autumn leaves under my feet, he didn’t move at all, as if he had frozen there behind the trunk, compelled to stare forward at Halton Cray like Narcissus when presented with a mirror. I could make out the back of him well enough while he stood there still as a painting. A chill ran through my veins as I looked over to him. Perhaps it was just the feeling I had that he could still see me. That he watched me despite facing the opposite direction. Perhaps it was my mind dabbling with fear, since this man seemed to excite some of it in me. Or, perhaps it was the dew dripping off the tree, settling in his short dark hair, glistening so it appeared like eyes staring at me. I would even go so
far to say that just for a second I saw a pair of eyes blink at the back of his head. Then I saw them move under his hair along the side of his head and disappear round to his face. At this point I pinched myself to see if I was dreaming.
I wasn’t.
Quickly, I headed back the way I came, entering the house by the alley to the courtyard. I didn’t dare look back for fear the American was watching or following me.
Geoffrey and Frances were just inside the southwest corridor. I felt safer now inside and in the company of people. They chatted about plans for Christmas. Both looked up as I came in short of breath.
‘Have you seen the displays in the shops, Alex?’ asked Frances. ‘Valentines cards out already! I bet that if we were to sift through them we’d find Easter cards at the back.’ She giggled.
I couldn’t process what she was saying. All I could think of were those creeping eyes. – Thom appeared from the Colman Smith Gallery, breaking the distraction. My stomach summersaulted. He looked just as troubled as before. We might have all been invisible where he didn’t look at any one of us, evading our eyes as if conscious he had the power of Medusa. He paced on to pass by, only Frances stopped him mid-stride with the same question she’d asked me.
‘I wouldn’t know,’ he answered irritably. ‘I try not to pay too much attention. Excuse me.’ and opening the door he crossed the alley before disappearing round the corner. Geoffrey and Frances carried on their conversation – probably used to him – and I, slipping away, went in the same direction as Thom to get to the front desk. As I turned the corner, he was walking back towards me with a manual or some catalogue under his arm. His fearsome approach induced me to ambush him.
‘Good afternoon, Thom.’ I stopped and smiled.
‘What’s good about it?’ He halted next to me, a storm brewing in his eyes. Clearly he was trying to keep it under control though I felt it might thunder out any minute.
Halton Cray (Shadows of the World Book 1) Page 9
