by Graeme Hurry
The other important and odd thing was the Director’s appearance. He sat behind his desk in that windowless room, and I had sat in a chair opposite him while he interviewed me. There were rows of masks placed as decoration upon the walls, varying in size and detail. Some of the masks were horned and demonic in appearance. Others were elongated, almost insect-like. There was a portrait of a man with white hair, and a wrinkled careworn face. The inscription below the portrait was: OUR FOUNDER.
There was a lamp on the desk, which was the only light in the room, but it was muted by its orange shade, which also cast a strange quality to the light. The Director had also moved the lamp as far away from him as possible, to the distant edge of the desk, so that his face was always obscured by shadow. For this reason, I never formed a distinct impression of his facial features. My own image was reflected back at me by the dark, mirror-like glasses he wore. He was tall and thin, but I couldn’t guess at his age or race. I remember his mouth moving: opening and closing, the lips twisting, the twitching of the muscles around it, the occasional glimmer of his teeth. I remember only that mouth and the slightly pointed, narrow chin. There was something grotesque and repellent about him.
The Director told me that the position I was applying for carried a great deal of responsibility. They were looking for someone entirely trustworthy. If I did well, there was a possibility of promotion. I would be very occupied, he said, because the building was exceptionally busy during the night shift hours I would be working, between 8pm and 4am. I was sceptical, but said nothing. At the end of the interview- although oddly, my interviewer had done most of the talking, and I had barely said a word- he told me that he felt I was ‘made from the right kind of material’ and I was perfect for the job. I would be appointed with immediate effect. He offered his congratulations. I was bewildered, as he had scarcely asked me a question, or asked to see my references, but when he stood up I realised it was a signal the interview was over. It struck me again how tall the Director was, and cadaverous in appearance. We shook hands, and although his grip was firm, his touch was cold. I was left with the feeling that the interview had been a sham- for some reason, I had already been chosen, even before it had taken place.
“If you do well Malcolm, the sky is the limit”, he rasped. Upon saying this, he pointed upwards.
He buzzed an intercom I hadn’t noticed before, and called for Cornelius. I’d be given a tour, the Director said, and then afterward I would immediately start my new job.
* * *
As it turned out, I was wrong about Mandrake House being quiet in the middle of the night. Quite the opposite, in fact. It was exceptionally busy. I never got a good look at the visitors, though. Most of the building and grounds were dimly lit, even at the best of times, and these ‘guests’ were usually clad in heavy dark overcoats, hats and scarves…whatever the weather. Curiously enough, these mysterious individuals preferred to wear sunglasses or coloured lenses at all times…even though it was perfectly dark outside, in the night time.
They were like cartoon spies, but I didn’t find them funny at all. Instead, these visitors- who I encountered in the Mandrake House library, and occasionally in the corridors while on my patrols- filled me with a profound sense of dread. If I had to pass by them, or wait for them to walk through a doorway, it took all my sense of self-control to resist the impulse to shudder. I was glad that I never had to speak to them, or engage with them at all, as part of my duties. I simply had to patrol…and make sure nothing was out of order. Whatever that meant. Here, nothing seemed to make any orderly or rational sense at all. The way I had been hired was just the start of it.
Occasionally these individuals held clandestine, whispered meetings in the dark and crooked corridors. When I saw them I would hurry by, and try not to observe their faces too closely. Most frequently, these sinister visitors or guests used the reference library at Mandrake House, which I have briefly mentioned already. I had first seen it when Cornelius gave me a tour of the building, and its shelves were filled from floor to ceiling with a vast quantity of dusty, archaic books, which were permanently housed there. I rarely read books, as my father often told me that books were dangerous things. He burned all of my mother’s books, I remember. I couldn’t imagine what relevant information could be contained in these volumes, which all these strangers were apparently required to consult, but occasionally a weighty tome would be left open on a desk. I caught glimpses of pages of text written in old-style lettering, some of it Latin, and weird diagrams and disturbing illustrations which made no sense to me. There were plenty of strange dots, dashes and squiggles. The pictures showed naked human beings, encased in glass chambers. One image showed a naked man screaming, mounted by some giant cockroach-type creature, while an insect proboscis penetrated his skull.
Cornelius gave me a map of Mandrake House, and within a week I had memorised it. I patrolled the corridors on the lower and upper levels; the hallways and staircases of the main building; the dining hall and auditorium; and the inner courtyards. Generally it was austere and shabby, a shell of what it must have been like in better days. The only places in the building that were out of bounds to me were the towers. I was to be discreet, and careful. I could relate nothing of what I saw within Mandrake House to the outside world. It was, of course, of great benefit to my new employers that I was a loner by nature.
I also began to enjoy some of the perks and benefits of full time employment. I was paid weekly, cash in hand. I wasn’t sure about tax arrangements, but I didn’t care. I went to the barbers and got a new haircut. I asked for it to be close-cropped, in a crew-cut style. It was easier to manage. I also bought a new grey suit for my work. I took great pleasure in seeing the surprise in my landlord’s eyes when I approached him- wearing my smart new suit- and paid my full rent for that wretched flat of his, including the amount I was in arrears and which he’d been pestering me about for ages. “So you’ve paid up at last”, he mumbled, as I walked away with a smile on my face. “Good, good…don’t be late next time.”
Mandrake House was such an impressive building- its exterior was, at least- that I found myself becoming curious about its history. I logged on to the Internet at the local public library and Googled it. I discovered that the building had been designed by Major Henry Envers Mandrake and the foundation stone had been laid in 1857. Originally, it had been used as an asylum, before being converted into an orphanage. The orphanage had nearly been closed down after a scandal involving physical and sexual abuse by the Rector, and the death of one of the orphans. Her ghost still reputedly haunted the cloisters of the west and east courtyards.
After the First World War it had become a girls school, and then after the Second World War the building had apparently become derelict and had entered a state of disrepair. The last entry for the building in the local history site that I found, stated that the Lindus Foundation had bought Mandrake House from the local council in the 1980s. There was no indication of their intentions or purposes for doing so.
* * *
Slowly, I adapted to a nocturnal lifestyle. I also found myself lingering in the corridors, to observe the paintings I’d seen when I first arrived. One painting caught my eye in particular: a perfect piece of surrealism, the distinct form and features of a man, somehow half-transformed into the shape of a twisted tree, rising up from thick ground-mist, against a grey background of fog. There were vague shapes and forms half-glimpsed in the background, yet indefinable. Something about the painting haunted me. I frequently returned to gaze at it and examine it more closely on a number of occasions. I even started to dream about that painting- although it would be more accurate to say it caused me fevered midday nightmares, when I was not working my shift. Fortunately, I had not seen any ghosts during my patrols of the old Victorian building (although at eleven o’clock one evening I definitely heard a feminine laugh behind me as I walked through the cloisters- whether that was an actual ghost or a visitor to the building, I cannot say), but the evening vis
itors still unnerved me.
I had been working at Mandrake House for six months when, one night, the Director called me again into his office. I had not seen the Director since my interview on my first night. He told me that he had been watching me closely since I had started the job, and that what I had seen had impressed him. He was very pleased with my work. I had been doing so well, he said, that I deserved a promotion. I distinctly remember him saying that I deserved to be part of the inner circle. “This is for you”, he said to me, opening a desk drawer and handing me an envelope. “This work must be done with the utmost care and attention. This must be kept confidential, as you are being entrusted with sensitive tasks of great importance. Do not share this with anyone. Your lips must remain sealed! If I have not made myself clear enough, I stress you must keep your mouth shut at all costs. I am confident that you will not fail us.”
I did not open the envelope until I had arrived home in the early hours of that morning. I unsealed it with trembling fingers, and drew out the sheet of paper that was inside. There were instructions printed on it. I read them, with a growing sense of bewilderment, and then burned it.
* * *
It must have been at least three months after I’d had the meeting about my ‘extra duties’ with the Director, that the police came to my flat. My shift the previous night had been stranger than usual, as if foreshadowing what was about to happen. There had barely been a visitor to Mandrake House, which was unusual. For the first time, the place had felt utterly lonely and desolate at night- and because of that, even eerier than usual. When I made my way home in the early hours of the morning, there was a thick fog in the air- a real pea-souper, as they might have said in the old days. There was also a smell, chemical or metallic, which seemed to hang in the air. You could almost taste it.
Usually I went to a cafe before I went home, to eat a greasy English Breakfast (riding the Cholesterol Express straight to Heart Attack Central) but on this morning I had no appetite. I also felt curiously drained of energy, and more tired than normal as well. That might have been partly explained by the extra tasks I had taken on, but it was still unlike me. My fevered nightmares had become frequent, but on this occasion I went straight to bed and immediately entered a deep, dreamless sleep.
It didn’t last long- I groggily awoke to the sound of hammering on the door of my flat. I was still padding around in a state of confusion, dressed only in a vest and underpants, when the uniformed police officers walked straight into my hallway. They hadn’t needed to break in. My obnoxious landlord was loitering behind them, and he had given them the keys. “There he is!” he was shouting. “I always knew there was something funny about him! Creepy little weirdo, ain’t he?”
I was arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to commit acts of terrorism, and for previous active participation in such acts. They told me that they suspected me of having links to anarchist groups. They discovered political pamphlets stuffed in cabinet drawers and cupboards in my flat. They also found a weapon, a revolver which I’d apparently concealed beneath a rotten floorboard. I had never seen the pamphlets or the gun before in my life. I know this was all planted there, but I do not know who did it.
I was handcuffed and taken down to the police station. Long hours of interrogation followed. I was questioned by two sadistic detectives named Malone and Doyle. They told me they could do whatever they wanted until they got answers out of me. I was beaten up and spat on. My nose was broken and I lost a couple of teeth. One eye became swollen shut.
At first I said nothing, but a visit from my mother persuaded me to change my mind. I knew you’d come to a bad end, she said. You were never any use to anyone.
But surely I’d been of use to someone.
Eventually I broke down and confessed it all. I told them everything about the job vacancy and the Lindus Foundation, Mandrake House, its mysterious visitors, Cornelius and the Director. I told them about the ‘extra duties’ I had agreed to do, on behalf of the Lindus Foundation, in addition to my work patrolling the premises and grounds of Mandrake House. I related how I had received my instructions either in the form of letters sealed in envelopes given to me by the Director, or by the Director himself calling me on the landline at my flat. I would sit in the darkness of the early morning or twilight, and wait for the telephone to ring. When the Director phoned me, he would sibilantly whisper his instructions on a crackling line. His voice was distorted by the phone, a distant echoing whisper which sometimes I could barely follow. Depending on his instructions, I would spend the day observing the comings and goings at various addresses in the seedier areas of the city, and write down my observations in my old battered notebook.
Why did I perform these duties unquestioningly? I was being paid, and given bonuses, and it was more money than I had ever earned before in my life. I enjoyed the status I had been given. I was trusted, and I had the sense I was doing something vitally important, even though I did not understand the nature of it. Even though the things I was doing appeared dubious, immoral or unethical, I’d had no qualms about co-operating.
In addition to being asked to follow certain persons, and write reports on them which I had left outside the Director’s office at Mandrake House, I had been asked to commit random acts of sabotage at private premises, factories and offices. I’d had a narrow escape at a residential property, where I’d been chased by guard dogs and had to scale a fence, but apart from that there had been no other mishaps or negative experiences…until the complex.
I had been asked to break into some kind of corporate complex. I had found myself lurking in the dark of a dimly lit car park, waiting for the right moment. The buildings had been framed in artificial light, in miniature from this distance- an assorted collection of shoeboxes amid groups of fir trees. Security had appeared non-existent. No one at reception, and no security guards to speak of.
I had wandered through a maze of corridors wondering what to do, what to make note of. My instructions had been exceptionally vague this time…if I had understood them properly. Halfway down one corridor, I had chosen a side door at random and entered.
The lights had come on automatically when I had entered the room. They had been dazzling, and caused me considerable pain. It had taken me a while to adjust. The room had been white and featureless, except for a tall glass cabinet built into the far wall. There had been a human body encased within, silhouetted against the sharp, unforgiving florescent light. It had been a man, and the light had revealed his surgical wounds with a brittle, raw horror.
Then I’d heard a voice which broke my shocked paralysis. “This is a restricted area. Do you have permission to be here?” I’d turned- seen a uniformed guard with a torch- and then ran at him, shoved him out the way, and made another frantic escape. There were barking dogs again, and more torches, but I’d managed to get away.
Until then, I’d done the work well, and efficiently. If anything, I’d experienced a sensational thrill from the work, a frisson, which I’d been missing from my life for a long time. The extra duties, and the financial bonuses, had livened up my previously mundane and gloomy existence.
As it turned out, the job centre claimed they knew nothing about the vacancy. I had always known Doreen Hawes would play a part in my downfall, I suppose. She had no memory of my visit that day. They had no employer details on record. The police went to Mandrake House and found it empty. It was abandoned, derelict. It had plainly been left to crumble and decay for the past few decades. The roof had leaked, various sections and floors were unstable, and there was damp and rot everywhere. Clearly, there was nothing for them to find. When they investigated the Lindus Foundation, the police discovered that it did not exist. It never had existed. There was no record of it anywhere- not even on the website that I claimed to have seen.
My trial was a straight-forward affair apart from one strange incident, and up until the judge decided that I was mentally unstable. Of course I had no defence, no rational explanation for the events that had
occurred and what I had done. Some of my actions and offences had been recorded on CCTV, for example, and I had confessed everything in my statements to the police. I mentioned a peculiar event- I recall that one afternoon during the trial, when the prosecution were speaking and I was standing in the dock- a piece of paper was passed to me. I do not remember whose hand pressed it into mine or where exactly it had come from, but when I opened it up I saw this sentence printed on it: YOU FAILED THE FIRST TEST. I looked around, but I saw no one watching me or looking in my direction. It could have come from the jury, one of the solicitors or someone in the public gallery. I stuffed the paper into my pocket, but when I looked for it later I couldn’t find it again. It must have fallen out.
It was later decided, after being cross-examined, that I was not fit to stand trial on the terrorism charges. As well as the acts I’d supposedly committed, my ‘illegible’ journal which had been retrieved from my flat and my personal insect collection (evidence of a meticulous, paranoid and obsessive personality, according to the solicitors) were brought forward as evidence. The judge pronounced me mentally unstable and delusional. Instead, I would be held in a mental institution. I told them all in the court that I was perfectly sane, and I didn’t know what they were talking about, but in response I only saw pitying looks and indulgent, patronising smiles.
