NOCTIPHOBIA
Little tales of horror by
Carol Grayson
Published and Copyright by Carol Grayson, 2012
Cover by Jürgen Roshop (www.turbinensound.de)
These short stories are a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2012 by Carol Grayson (pen-name of Carola Kickers)
All rights reserved. No part of this short story may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of Carol Grayson (Carola Kickers), except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
For more information on the Author: www.carola-kickers.de
When the fog rose
The large animal awoke just like it always did shortly after sunset. It couldn’t stretch itself, even though it continued to grow. Its powerful, irregular heartbeat was comparable to the sound of gongs that could be heard even at a great distance. A thousand tiny eyes in limber bodies set off to provide sight for the large animal. It was hungry and it spat the fog out, thick and cool like moist batting, taking the breath from all living creatures. London was alive!
John Doe knew that the animal had to be fed, just like every night when the fog rolled in from the Thames. But this time he could barely move. He had laid his hot forehead against the cool iron bars, but since the last time he had purposely injured himself by constantly hitting his head against them, they had attached wire gauze in front of them. He once again pressed his head against them, but this time the gauze simply yielded to the pressure. He observed how his breath mixed with that of the city. The muted sounds of the harbour forced themselves into the room from afar. He once again jerked on the massive leather straps forcing his arms onto his back.
He knew that the others were watching him through the flap of the door. He didn’t even need to turn around to know that. They were whispering, but he suspected he knew what they were talking about.
Professor Rainford and his assistant, Dr. Stokes, were standing outside the heavy door. “He always acts so strange when the fog rolls in,” Strokes noted.
His thickset build reminded one of a bulldog. Even his facial expression was identical. Only the horn-rimmed glasses provided him with an academic touch. Rainford, a good two heads taller and conceivably gaunt, had his hands in the pockets of his white lab coat. He seemed to be contemplating a Freudian theory. Out of admiration for his great role model, he has also cultivated the same type of beard. He then grumbled in a very wise manner, “Humm…,” and once again, “hummmm”.
“At least he can’t injure himself any longer. We’ve secured the cell as well as possible and the straitjacket will do the rest,” Stokes reported while staring at his notes on his pad.
“More importantly is that he won’t able to cause any harm to anyone else,” the Professor admonished peering almost punitively at Stokes.
“Yes, of course, you’re absolutely right. What he did to his victims was more… perfidious,” his assistant hastened to add.
“Yes, indeed. And I would truly like to know where he obtained his medical expertise,” murmured Rainford, turning to look into the cell once again.
Their patient remained standing with his back to them, gazing out the small window. “The police assume they are dealing here with an autodidact.”
“Impossible! Considering the way that he… um… dissected the women…”
“…could he have possibly been taught by a butcher,” Stocks added overeagerly.
“Bah,” Rainford spewed contemptuously. The man standing close to the window was very disturbing to him.
Since his admittance, he had only spoken once to him. John Doe’s sinister eyes glared at him, or better yet bore through him. He’d asked him questions and this man had provided answers in a manner that suggested that he had experienced some sort of higher education. However, he refused to provide them withhis name, so they called him “John Doe” in old police tradition.
The man was obviously in the best of health. But his psyche seemed to exist in two different worlds. And every time the fog rose, he lost control and became aggressive.
“Bring him into my office. I’d like to speak to him once again,” Rainford instructed his assistant.
“Now? In the middle of the night?”
“Now! But make sure to leave the straitjacket on.”
Stokes couldn't believe that his boss would arrange a session at such a godforsaken hour. And what if something should happen to him? The sanatorium suffered under a chronic staff shortage and if this madman attacked the professor, a guard might not be able to intervene quickly enough.
A little while later the man in the white straightjacket sat across from the professor. The scholar had lit a pipe and sat regarding the middle-aged man, whose somewhat unkempt appearance was only accentuated by his 5 o'clock shadow look.
"How would you describe your relationship with your mother?" Rainford inquired, getting straight to the point.
"I never had a mother."
Displeased, Rainford raised his eyebrows.
"And how would you describe the relationship with your father?"
"Didn't have him neither!"
"Then you were raised in an orphanage?"
"Labour camp!"
The man was staring at him at him with a mixture of disgust and dread. His dark eyes appeared to widen and he let the scholar have a glimpse into his past: Rainford saw an eleven year old boy on the coal barges, who was regularly kicked and beaten if he didn't work hard enough.
The picture changed: Now Rainford saw a seven year old in the bed of courtesan who was laughing at him.
Once again the picture changed and Rainford flinched unwilling: He saw the flashing of a long, sharp surgeon's scalpel in the hand of the madman. But only the hand and the knife, the rest of the body and the surroundings were enshrouded by a grey fog.
Rainford closed his eyes – shaking his head as if trying to wake up from a nightmare– and then reopened them again.
"Dammit, what was that?" he muttered.
The guy in front of him offered him a sarcastic grin.
"Seen enough, Professor? How do you like my skills?"
Rainford laid his pipe aside, thoroughly tapping it out. He wanted to, somehow, win some time.
"You are obviously a telepath," he stated with a calm voice. Then, in the same inflection: "Have you ever killed women?"
"Did you see that?"
Rainford shook his head.
The chap leaned forward. "I know who it was though," he hissed. "I've been following him for a while now."
"And why haven't you gone to the police?"
The man burst out bitterly laughing. "Well, I'm sure they'll believe a homeless beggar."
"No wonder considering the way you've reacted up till now," the clinic director cynically remarked.
"Well, what should I then do? I can only find the murder when I get out of here. He will kill again tonight. I swear. He always kills when the fog rolls in."
"And how do you know this?"
His patient collapsed. He seemed to have given up his resistance. "I saw him, that day in the whorehouse in Aldgate. The first time that he killed one of them. Gutted her like an animal."
He seemed to be disgusted by the recollection.
"He knows that I follow him. Each time his enjoyment grows in showing me how clever he is. He fully aware of the fact that I can locate him. It's only his name I don't know. This time he even managed to cast the suspicion on me. And
now I'm sitting here instead of that... creature."
"Creature?"
The man lifted his gaze once again and grinned. "Well, what would you call someone like that? Respectable citizen on the outside and then…"
"Humm. If you're right, then we'll have another dead body by tomorrow."
John Doe nodded. "There are far more than you could ever guess!" he added quietly.
"If not, you will stay with us and eventually be executed," Rainford declared.
Doe nodded again.
Rainford stood up. "Good, then we'll wait until the morning. I'll have you brought back to your cell."
* * *
The next morning there was no mention in the newspaper about a woman's dead body and during the next few weeks, there were no unsolved murders in London. John Doe was sentenced to execution by hanging on September 24th, 1888.
Five days after his death, the great beast's breath of mist wafted once again through the streets. A pair of rats with moisture-matted hair slid through the gutter. Their snouts were covered in blood. For the past few weeks, there had been more than enough prey for all far below in the canalization. But now, even the bones had all been gnawed bare. This night, however, had finally provided them with fresh meat. Somewhere in the urban slums of London, the man that so amply supplied them was underway in this weather; the man that would later be known to mankind as "Jack the Ripper". After the first five dead prostitutes, the murder series were considered completed. To this day, the other victims were never found.
* * *
The Requiem
A delicate shroud of mist crept out of the gully covers of the sleeping city. Street lamps and neon lettering on the stores simultaneously expelled and aroused the darkness. A stray dog searched for edible scraps in the steel bins on a side street behind a diner. The heat of an excruciating long summer day had not yet abated. The small city had difficulty breathing. Even the music and laughter emanating from the casino had fallen silent in the meantime.
The dog lifted his head. His keen ears had registered something that wasn't quite right tonight. He picked up the scent. It smelled like a storm was brewing and the clear starlit sky was already beginning to be covered up by dark streaks. But there was something else. Something, which people could not hear. It sounded sweet, seductive, like an ominous melody. The mutt with the shaggy, mustard-coloured fur whimpered quietly. He began to run. The dog was the only thing that left the city that night.
They came with the shadows of the clouds, which had – in the meantime– blocked out the stars. The rumbling of the initially remote thunder steadily increasing and along with it, the yearning wailing of a violin. Silently wafting, they moved through the deserted streets like a foreign army. Large, dark shapes with bland facial features and burning eyes. The tallest creature amongst them played the instrument with virtuous, svelte fingers. The bow glided over the strings in accordance to the rhythm created by the flashes of lightening. Sometimes louder, sometimes softer it enticed one to dance while the intruders approached the people's houses. Neither walls nor doors seemed able to stall them. They slid through every crevice, every keyhole taking on the form of black fog, manifesting themselves afterwards. They often had it easy at this very hot time of year because people slept with their windows open. The obligatory metal fire ladders hung in front of the windows of the multistoried, older houses, which only made it that much easier for the unwanted visitors to enter. Only the fiddler in his long, black cloak, the hood covering his head, stayed outside and moved through the streets like a gypsy searching for alms. And his performance cast a spell on the residents of Almond Grove, leading them deep into the underworld from which there was no escape. The tone of his instrument was not directly audible to the human ear; however, it was perceptible, similar to infrasound.
Emily Haynes also left her bedroom window in the second story of her apartment building open during such hot, sticky weather. Beside her on the night table was a bottle of water to quench her nocturnal thirst. Her unconsciousness registered the roll of thunder in her sleep, awakening hopes of cool relief in the morning. However, her unconsciousness also registered something else; a resonant melody, alluring and tender, its tempo increasing from Adagio to Moderate then to Presto and back again.
The young, beautiful woman tossed and turned under the thin sheets. Tiny beads of sweat glittered on her flawless forehead. Her mouth formed the name “John” in her sleep. They had argued the evening before, when she had once again begged her fiancé to stop the gambling and no longer put their mutual future at stake. John left in a furious rage, slamming the door behind himself. It had sounded like a final farewell. This argument weighed heavily on Emily’s heart and increased her uneasiness even more.
Then, suddenly, she lay totally still. Breathing deeply and soundly. An unusual, calming scent filled her bedroom; a scent that was only ever found in ancient churches – somewhat similar to incense, cool water and ancient oak – mellow and rich. It reminded Emily of her childhood, when she had regularly attended Sunday mass with her parents. She smiled in her sleep. No one saw this smile, only the creature that had infiltrated her room together with the scent, probing into her thoughts and dreams until it found what it had been looking for. He assumed the shape of her beloved John even before she managed to open her eyes.
A bolt of lightening illuminated the room for the fraction of a second and Emily awoke with a fright. Then she caught sight of the familiar face of her fiancé sitting on the edge of her bed. Relieved, she stretched out her arms to him. John leaned over her, wiping the moist, dark brown hair from her brow. His lips hovered over her mouth which was impatiently awaiting his kiss. His lips were cool, just like his hands, which now caressed her like a breeze all over. His kisses tingled like champagne on her skin and put her into a state of trance to which Emily numbly submitted. Occasionally, a flash of lightening illuminated the room and threw the shadow of the young couple’s lovemaking onto the wall facing the window. Despite the storm, the heat appeared to increase, and not only in Emily’s bedroom.
In the meantime, the violinist’s performance reached a Crescendo, which was ultimately drowned out by deafening thunder.
And suddenly everything went silent, unbelievably still. The black clouds piled up into mountains in the sky. And in Emily’s bedroom the white cotton sheet turned a crimson rot, soaking up the last drops that the creature had left in her body. Emily lay staring at the wall with a glassy-eyed, helpless expression, a strange smile playing about her lips. All the residents of Almond Grove were submitted to similar experiences that night, but none experienced such a beautiful, loving death as Emily had.
Quietly, a different melody arose from the street, enticing the shadowy creatures to leave the human homes. One after the other, they disappeared, just as they had appeared, until the last creature with the violin absconded and the last tone faded away.
Finally, the rain came– or more appropriately– a tidal storm raged. It spewed out of the mountain of clouds which had previously piled themselves menacingly over the city.
* * *
The next morning Sheriff Tucker from the neighbouring city drove his old police car though a squeaky-clean and sunshiny Almond Grove. Only the moisture had not yet totally dissipated. The trees and rooftops still dripped a little. The remaining rainwater flew across the congested eaves into the already overfilled rain barrels, eventually creating a torrent in the gutters. The sun had already graced the sky for a period of four hours and was threatening to create another sweltering hot day, the humidity making it difficult to breathe.
A concerned relative had informed him that the residents of the city were unreachable by phone, even though no technical malfunction was apparent. Sheriff Tucker knocked on all the doors in vain. Nobody opened. He eventually resorted to the crowbar in the trunk of his car and violently broke open the door of a single-detached home. Finally reaching the bedroom, he eventually found the reason why nobody had opened the doors. The old man had not die
d of natural causes, the bites on his neck and the rust-coloured stains on his already soiled bedding confirmed this. An old ventilator was still humming beside the bed and tried
– in vain – to cool the room. But that was no longer necessary.
The Sheriff found almost the same scene in the neighbouring house. Tucker immediately informed the Federal police, who appeared within a few short hours.
* * *
“It appears as if none of them defended themselves. Strange,” stated Agent Stanley Ford avidly taking notes. Both men stood in front of Tucker’s police car while various FBI co-workers secured evidence in the surrounding houses.
“A ghost town,” Sheriff Tucker sighed still pale and obviously upset. He wiped the sweat from his forehead with a slightly dirty tissue and took a long drink from his water bottle.
The FBI agent in the trim suit scrutinized him over the rims of his sunglasses.
“Do you have an explanation for this?” he asked in an unusually cool tone of a voice belonging more to that of a tax attorney. Tucker shook his head. “Not really. To outsiders, Almond Grove has always appeared as being very civilized,” but then remarked, “however, behind the scenes it wasn’t quite so mannered and orderly,” he continued. “A distillery, casino, betting on horses, prostitution – just the right kind of town for the Mafia to launder their money.”
Agent Ford pushed his sunglasses onto his head. “Gang warfare?” he asked matter-offactly.
Once again the Sheriff shook his head. “I don’t know about that, up till now there have been no violent crimes to speak of. Far from it! All the residents here have profited from the dirty money.”
“But instead they have mass murderers here who suck out their victim’s blood,” the Federal Agent added almost cynically. Tucker capitulated, shrugging his shoulders.
“It looks as if someone got even with the whole city, regardless as to whether or not they were actually guilty,” summarized Ford.
Tucker turned a whiter shade of pale at that particular comment. The long-forgotten verses of bible lessons during Sunday school came to mind; “Almost like Sodom und Gomorrah…” he murmured more-or-less to himself.
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