The Spinetinglers Anthology 2011

by Nolene-Patricia Dougan

  Vlad smiled again and Polidori noticed they were standing outside the inn where he was staying.

  “Well, John Polidori, you have saved yourself, but I will ask you one thing.” Polidori looked up at Vlad. Relief had not entered his mind yet; he was still sure that he would die by this creature’s hand. “Do not be frightened of me anymore. What I ask in return for your life is very little.”

  “What is it?”

  “I want you to never tell anyone about me. If you keep this secret, I will let you live.”

  Polidori thought this was an easy promise to make and he readily agreed. “Of course.”

  “Do not be hasty. Keeping this secret may be the hardest thing you have ever had to do.”

  “I give you my oath: I will never mention Lord Ruthven to anyone.”

  “Very well,” Vlad clasped his icy hand around Polidori. He felt his strength and power and he knew from that moment on, if he did not keep this oath he would be sure to die by his hand.

  Before Vlad let go, he said one more thing to Polidori. “That man you travel with, he is not your friend. Mark my words, he will cast you aside if he sees even a glimmer of anything creative within you.”

  “You are wrong,” Polidori said.

  “Am I? We shall see,” Vlad answered, and with this he turned his back and walked away. Polidori ran to his room, hoping that Ruthven would not change his mind. He ran upstairs and looked out the window. When he studied the street below, Ruthven had gone. Polidori hoped it was forever, but something in his heart told him he would see him again.

  ***

  Sometime later, Polidori was indeed traveling with Byron again. This time, they had two further traveling companions—Percy Shelley and his wife, Mary. They were traveling to Italy, but the storms had stopped them dead in their tracks. They took a house on Lake Geneva and waited for the storms to pass.

  Shelley and Byron had been almost intolerable on this trip, both of them trying to outdo the other. Polidori was becoming increasingly tired of their constant rivalry, while his own talent was never even considered. One evening, the storms seemed to have dispersed completely, but they were staying another few days just to make sure. That evening, Byron and Shelley proposed a contest.

  “We should write a ghost story,” Byron said. “At the end of the evening when we are done, we should compare our stories to each other’s.”

  “Are we all eligible to enter the competition?” Mary asked. Byron laughed at Mary’s request.

  “Of course, my dear, you can play along if you want to. I doubt you will have anything too much to offer, but you can certainly try,” Percy said.

  Polidori tapped Mary on the hand and whispered, “don’t listen to him, Mary. I am sure our stories will be far better than theirs.”

  Polidori had never spoken a truer word. Byron heard his words but did not say anything; he simply scoffed at them for the moment. The four got to work and Polidori looked at the bright sky outside his window. This time, he was determined to tell a story that would be far better than anything Byron or Shelley could produce. Polidori searched his mind for a place to start and he was suddenly reminded of the dark stranger that had entered his life—he knew what his story was going to be about. The four sat down and each, in turn, started to relate their stories. Polidori was third to tell his tale.

  “It happened in the midst of the dissipations attendant upon a London winter….” As Polidori began his tale, the bright sky outside his window darkened and a storm began again. It was exactly a year and a day after he had made his oath to Vlad.

  Polidori managed to stun the whole room with his tale of Lord Ruthven, the Vampyre. Shelly and Byron were speechless, and they had more to come as Mary began to speak.

  “I busied myself to think of a story, a story to rival those which had excited us to this task. One which would speak to the mysterious fears of our nature, and awaken thrilling horror, one to make the reader dread to look round, to curdle the blood, and quicken the beatings of the heart….”

  The room was stunned into silence again. Shelley and Byron had been outplayed and outmatched. They were shown to seem like amateurs in this room by a doctor and a nineteen-year-old girl. Shelley was stunned by the story Mary had related, so he turned to Byron and said, “do you see what I have, George? She is a goddess.” Percy picked up his wife’s hand and kissed it. “I will never belittle you again, Mary—you will always be able to impress me.”

  Byron’s reaction to his friend’s literary prowess was quite different. The raucous laughter that had preceded the storytelling was no longer there. After Percy and Mary had gone to bed, Byron had a talk with Polidori.

  “I think it is time we parted company,” Byron began.

  “What did you say?”

  “I think you heard me.”

  “I can’t believe you are saying this to me. Just because Mary and I embarrassed you this evening….”

  “Embarrassed me! How dare you, you could never embarrass me. I want you to pack up your bags and leave.”

  “I was warned you would do this, but I defended you—I said it would never happen.”

  “I don’t want to see your face again.” These were Byron’s last words to Polidori.

  Polidori packed his bags and returned to England. He watched over his shoulder for months, waiting for Vlad to appear. He waited for him to bark at him, “remember your oath,” as Polidori had stated in his story, but it did not happen.

  Polidori thought he was free from Ruthven and decided to publish the story. He wanted to get some acclaim as a writer, just to show Byron he could. He published the story. It was well received and still, there was no sign of Lord Ruthven. After five years had drifted by, Polidori thought he was free from the creature, but he was wrong. One night, in his apartment, Lord Ruthven made one final visit.

  Polidori came home to his apartments and was startled to see Lord Ruthven sitting in the corner. Polidori shuddered when he saw him and he knew his time had come. Vlad threw a published edition of his story at him.

  “You didn’t remember your oath.”

  “I didn’t,” Polidori replied.

  “Then you realise that I have come for you.”

  “I do.”

  “Was it worth it?” Vlad asked.

  “Yes, it was. It was worth it to see the look on Byron’s face as I relayed a story that was far superior to anything he had ever thought of.” Vlad sped towards Polidori and bit down hard into his neck. Polidori’s life was over, but his story of ‘The Vampyre’ would live on.

  ***

  Stoker was still sitting in the chair in the Library as Isabella finished her tale.

  “That is unbelievable,” he said.

  “You still need more proof,” Isabella said.

  “Your story is unbelievable. Even with the things I have seen today, I believe my mind is playing tricks on me.”

  Isabella snatched a letter opener and plunged it down deep into her arm. Stoker tried to grab the knife away from her, but Isabella pulled it from her arm before Stoker could get to it. She held up her arm and Bram watched in terror as the wound healed instantly before his eyes; not even a scar was left on her white skin.

  “Do you believe now?” Isabella asked.

  “I do, I definitely do, do not injure yourself anymore.”

  Stoker looked around the library to see if anyone else had seen the miraculous thing he had just witnessed, but to his surprise, no one was looking over at them. Everyone was doing exactly what they had been before Isabella stabbed her arm. They still had their eyes buried in the books or they were still looking through the shelves—none of them looking over towards Isabella.

  “I don’t want them to see me,” Isabella said. “And the people I choose not to see me, don’t; it’s as simple as that.” Stoker remembered the story of Polidori and he now became frightened.

  “Are you going to make me promise you never to tell?”

  “No, quite the contrary. I want you to tell a story�
�Vlad’s story.”

  “Why?”

  “He was a great man and then he was a great Vampire. He deserves what was taken away from him. He deserves his immortality.” Isabella handed him the documents, the diaries and the journals. “Here, you can make a story from these—a great story.”

  “What about you? Can I say anything about you?”

  “You will forget me.”

  “I think you are wrong. I will never forget you.”

  Isabella laughed. “I have told you, you will forget me. Do you not realise when I want someone to do something, they do it?”

  Stoker started to leaf through the pages of the documents Isabella had given him. Isabella got up to leave.

  “Wait a minute. What about these people in this book—they are probably still alive?”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t worry about them.” Isabella’s voice seemed quite sinister when she issued these words. Bram Stoker watched as she left the library, but by the time she got to the door of the room, Stoker had already forgotten her name. By the time she got outside the library, Stoker had forgotten what sort of creature she was and he started to believe he was the one who had written the papers on the table before him.

  The Cinder Cat

  By Ella Mai

  It was in every respect, a most diffident cat, despite being purchased from a family who could easily be traced to that of the Tsars of Russia. Cornelius eyed the feline with a distinct lack of gusto as it sat unhampered on its newly acquired perch aboard the kitchen table. This chat du maison was the newest addition to a life that was all but done.

  I cannot sleep anymore than I can be awake by this point. I’m tired. Just as Cornelius cannot live anymore than he can die. He is tired. We are in a shared state. He from his fiction and me from...

  What shall I call this world we are in?

  It seems no word is aptly big, nor small, enough to describe the experience of being alive. Poems, music and indeed novels, can touch down at times, in defined clarity on a facet of this world, but never can we capture the whole in its glorious entirety.

  Me and Cornelius, I shall say, meet between the story and its writer.

  Yes I will make do with this.

  Cornelius sits, his appearance somewhat dusty like the house about him. Not just his clothes but his skin and his eyes too. And should we search his insides I believe they would too be dusty. Cornelius sips his tea but it doesn’t taste like he wants it to. Like it did when it slipped down his sun soaked throat of the past. But stop! It doesn’t do to harp back, it!

  “I know that,” replies Cornelius, “still the thought would not restrain itself from my head. I have my memories, and one cannot possibly forget their memories, so I will thank you kindly not to reprimand me for not achieving the impossible.”

  In my opinion, His sense of humour has grown a little dusty too but shhhh!!!! He didn’t hear me say that.

  He looks at the cat and asks its age in his head. The grey fur face looked to him and asked nothing.

  Ah yes! We are expecting a visitor! Cornelius exclaimed in mental discussion with himself. He rose from the chair and checked about the house for the pre-guest adjustments, the useless shuffling of magazines, the vase moved an inch to the left and then back again, the appearance of the house remaining much the same throughout these petty movements, if not identical.

  And then, the sound of the bell.

  And then, the door opening.

  And now I’ve woken up now. I’m paying attention.

  For there, stood the young boy, Constantin. Blonde, slim and fresh faced. Immaculate attire. 15 years of age.

  “Hello good sir,” Constantin held out a hand in a confident manner.

  Cornelius shook it more by reflex than conscious welcome. His mind was briefly entangled up in handshakes of the past. Like he said, one cannot forget their memories. Memories of Research Prizes, Literary awards; the life of an academic is riddled with handshakes of one form and another, all as dusty as the next one.

  Cornelius is still tired. He hasn’t woken up.

  “Do come in,” said Cornelius. He spoke with a slight lump in his throat that was proving difficult to shift these days. “Sit down at the table, don’t mind the cat”

  “I won’t mind the cat,” replied Constantin, seating himself down and fixing the animal with a sure footed look. Each beheld the other for a moment. And Constantin broke into a smile.

  “What a remarkable specimen you have here sir.”

  “It’s his diffidence which gets me,” the old man replied, “This cat is worth a bloody fortune. I bought him at a Moscow market would you believe. In the eastern quarter, it’s on every four years for the first week in July, most expensive market in the world.”

  He pointed a dextral finger at the cat’s unassuming visage. “He is a breed most rare, a particular branch off the Persian blue I believe, legend has it that the fur of this cat is made purely from the cinders of a manuscript containing the greatest words ever burned.”

  “Burned words?” Questioned Constantin. “Is there such a category by which to judge this hierarchy of fiction? How on earth can you judge which is the best, if all the evidence is down to cinders”

  “Tis but a legend my boy, a lie none the less, spun from nothing but the desire for gold, told by the ill-chosen patron who sold me this extortionate animal. A Mr. Jacob Colt, if you must know. That confounded man. Let me assure you, there is nothing that can spin a lie better than sweet gold’s web of desire.”

  “That is ridiculous. A web cannot spin, as it is that which has been spun,” said the boy, asserting his apparent intellect.

  “Don’t be atrocious, and disagree with everything I say, you are not here for my humble employment of your keen one-upmanship, nor your disagreeable temperament.” Cornelius smiled, his papery skin descending into a fully-fledged origami massacre, “There is room only for one of those and god knows it shall be mine. Now let us get to work.”

  “May I query you once more?” Said Constantin, without a trace of hesitancy.

  Old eyes met young. Two eyes saw better than another’s. Two eyes knew more than another’s. Whether these two factions met in the same pair of eyes, I shan’t indulge. I am after all, just the writer.

  Cornelius said, not in the least disgruntled as he admired brassiness, “go on.”

  “If you didn’t believe the tale,” Constantin wrapped his finger around the grey blue boa of the cat’s tail, with a toying look in his eye, “why on earth did you pay such an extortionate fee?”

  “My boy, you are far too big for your boots. And I shall ensure that you shall be swimming in them before long. But I’ve always liked an impudent manner in a young upstart, so I will merit you with a response.

  My life, Constantin, is not short of gold. But it was becoming somewhat short of amusement, let me tell you.

  As an antidote to this forlorn epiphany. I held in my head, an image to render me warm hearted. The face of an arrogant Puss. Atop my fridgidaire. When I descend for my foolish midnight hot chocolate, that face, Constantin would make me smile a while. Alors... I decided to find myself the most expensive cat in Russia. For his would surely be that face in my thoughts. The proud puffed lordly glare, was what I so desired of my pet.

  But behold he is most diffident. I am not in the least amused by him.”

  “Indeed sir. I see exactly what you mean. But may I suggest a charming notion which has just this second bestowed itself upon me.” He didn’t wait to be invited to continue, of course, “I can paint you a feline sir. I shall use this one as a model, but I will put a regal sheen on him, I will paint him ensconced on velvets, set his eyes to see above you at all times, maybe even be so drole as to put a crown atop his head. Will this Sir, Serve to tickle your taste buds.”

  “My boy I do not want to eat the thing,” he jibed. “But yes! I shall hang it above the Frigidaire and try not to look at him.” He points a silent thumb to the cat, briskly so as not to be seen by those humble green eyes.
Cornelius after all, knew that the cat was sensitive.

  With that plan in place, the two got up from the table and set their course for the living room, heading down a damp wooden corridor, aligned with bookshelves. The eyes of the young boy were roving, along every shelf, grappling for titles and a spark of understanding of each hefty volume, any assumption he could snatch as he was whisked briskly past in the wake of his new boss.

  ***

  They arrived at destination. A large oval sort of chamber. The belly of the beast. Shelves upon shelves of dusty old manuscripts, torn and dishevelled, the fire crackling, the red rug before it. The desk piled high. The long dead plants, stringing their last across a forgotten window sill, gasping their last in their own personal potted Sahara.

  Cornelius headed for his desk out of habit and sat in the wooden chair behind. Constantin took to the leather armchair beside the fire. He leaned right back into it. Comfortable. His eyes rose from admiring the rich red rug on the floor to meet those of the old mans, just visible over skyscrapers of papers, those untapped stacks, that nearly obscured the old man completely.

  “How absurd,” Cornelius crinkled his glance. “I have not had company here in so long that the stacks are near up to eye level and I didn’t even notice. Why, I never have the inclination to look up at anyone, only downwards at these many, many pages.”

  He waved a hand of fatigue, indicating that his reference applied, not just to the stacks of paper atop his desk, but to the whole cavernous room. A hand which behaved as if all these words had gone and run their course, before he’d reached the ending.

  He stood up and signalled for Constantin to do the same.

  “We will start in the east corner, my boy, and work ourselves westwards.”

  “Like the sun,” Constantin said with understanding

  “Ah yes! Indeed. The course of the sun for my newly acquired son, how apt”

  “Excuse me Sir, Your son?”