A HAZY SHADE OF WINTER

by Simon Bestwick

  I nodded. Rachel and her Aunt Mildred were a regular feature on New Barton Street, making their way down to the park to feed the ducks. Mildred was about sixty, but looked older, closer to eighty if anything; appearances aside, she was normally in full possession of all her faculties, a sensible, rational woman with a warm sense of humour.

  I said normally. Of course, there are exceptions to every rule. In Mildred’s case, there was one, just one. That exception was tonight: Hallowe’en.

  There was nothing superstitious about it; Rachel told me that she often wished there were. A kindly woman, she had taken care of Mildred after their respective husbands had both passed on. What happened every Hallowe’en only strengthened my respect for Rachel, even though she’d been too young to know her mother.

  I looked at the photograph again, but this time I wasn’t looking at Mildred or at Rachel’s mother, Elaine. Instead, I looked at the father, Mr Harrington. Nothing much to recommend him there. The moustache, the hair that had very slightly begun to thin over the crown. No doubt he’d worn glasses, but some small twinge of vanity prevented him wearing them for the photograph; his eyes squinted slightly. It might have been the face of any clerk in any office in Britain at that time. The hands were pale and long, smooth-looking for the little that I could see. It was hard to imagine them gripping the haft of an axe.

  But, of course, they had.

  I nearly jumped out of the chair as a shadow fell over me, darkening the picture.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ Mildred smiled. ‘Did I startle you?’

  ‘Sorry,’ I began, starting to rise, but she waved me back down.

  ‘I’m the one who should apologise,’ she said. ‘You’ve been more than kind, Iain; I know Rachel appreciates what you’re doing. She’s a dear, is Rachel. Spending her time taking care of an old madwoman like me. She deserves a rest for one year. I just hope it isn’t too hard on you.’

  ‘I wouldn’t think it would be.’ I’d worked for a time as a nurse in an old folks’ home, and so I’d soothed a few confused or frightened old dears in my time. As soon as the thought had articulated itself in my mind I knew that it sounded patronising, and felt ashamed of it.

  Mildred reached out a slender hand with its wrinkled, papery skin for the picture. ‘May I?’

  As I passed it to her I found myself unwillingly stealing a glance at the clock. It was almost half past seven. At my shoulder, Mildred chuckled. I started again, turned round.

  ‘Clock-watching?’ she smiled. ‘Don’t worry, I do the same. Seven minutes and thirty seconds past eight, that’s when the fun starts.’

  She took out a packet of Lambert and Butler and lit one. Her hands trembled slightly as she did so. She offered the packet to me, and I accepted.

  For a while we smoked in silence. Mildred studied the picture, her expression unreadable. I wondered if I should take it from her; she’d have enough to deal with in the business of bad memories before much longer. She must have read the idea in my expression, because, unexpectedly, she broke into a grin.

  ‘Don’t worry yourself, love. It’ll be a bad ’un whether my mind’s already on it or not. Believe me.’ The humour went out of her face. She looked tired instead—deathly tired. ‘I’ve tried everything over the last fifty years, Iain love. Saved up one year to go abroad, Rachel and me. Didn’t do a ha’p’orth of good. There I was on October 31st, posh hotel room in Kingston, and . . .’ She let it trail off, puffing her fag instead. ‘Well. You can imagine.’

  I hadn’t, but now I was beginning to. ‘Has it been every year—since . . .?’

  She nodded. ‘Without fail, and always the same time. No getting away from some things, Iain. You just have to live with them as best you can. All you can do.’

  I couldn’t say anything to that. It wasn’t a lesson I particularly wanted to learn, much less accept, but I guessed that Mildred was pretty much the living proof of it.

  ‘You don’t mind me talking of it, do you?’ she asked suddenly. I shook my head. ‘It’s just,’ she went on, ‘I thought you might be better equipped to handle it if you knew something of what happened.’

  ‘Sure,’ I said. ‘Go ahead.’

  ‘I know that theirs wasn’t a happy marriage,’ she said after a few seconds’ thought, her gaze darting from my face to the clock on the mantlepiece and back again. ‘Certainly it was never a love match. There was someone else for father, but he had to break it off, while mother wasn’t exactly faithful herself. I don’t know whose fault it was to begin with—I think Elaine was the reason they had to get married—but from the little I remember and what I’ve been able to piece together since, father grew to hate us all. Mother was no help—she never missed an opportunity to belittle him. I think he came to doubt that Arthur and I were his children, and to hate Elaine for forcing him to marry mother. Elaine was her mother’s daughter, too. And Elaine’s husband, James, he wasn’t much better—it was him who took that picture. All that, and dreaming of what he could have had with whoever it was. . . . I remember, a couple of times we heard him laughing, or crying—for no reason we could tell. I think he must have been going mad.

  ‘And then, of course, came Hallowe’en. He’d been up late, smoking his pipe and reading his book, we thought. All we heard, coming up the stair, was this little tinkling and clanking, like wind-chimes—from this little charm bracelet he’d taken to wearing. Then there was this terrible screaming from mother’s room, and an awful noise—like chopping wood. A crunching thud, again and again. On and on it went, until I thought it would never end.

  ‘I could hear Elaine and James; they were visiting, staying over, while a babysitter looked after Rachel. James was shouting, trying to sound in charge. He did that a lot. Then he started whimpering—he must have seen what father had done to mother. Then father was shouting, James was screaming, Elaine was screaming, and there was that crunching thud, twice. James’s screams got worse; then they stopped and he was just whimpering again. Elaine was screaming like a mad thing; then there was that crunch again and she stopped—just like that. I learned later—years later—that he’d split her skull with that one blow. Crown to chin. Can you imagine that? The hatred it would take to do that to your own child? At times I almost feel pity for him—can you imagine what could have driven a man to do that? My father wasn’t an evil man—not at first. . . .’

  Her cigarette burnt down between her fingers. She stubbed it clumsily out to smoulder in the ashtray, then lit another and continued.

  ‘James was still whimpering, and my father was making these grunting, straining, noises.’ Incredibly, she tried to force a shaky smile. I suppose it was that or complete collapse. ‘And we heard his feet, tramping slowly up the stairs. And the wind-chime tinkle of that charm bracelet. . . .

  ‘He smashed the door open and burst through. By then I was holding Arthur. He took one almighty swing at us both, and then . . . I was lying on the floor.’

  She touched her head. Almost lost beneath the careful combing of her curls was a long white scar where the axe blade had struck her a glancing blow. The blow had only been glancing because most of its force had been taken by her brother. Unconsciousness had come quickly, but not quickly enough.

  ‘Next thing I knew, I was in hospital. They told me that my father had killed my mother, my brother, my sister and her husband, and then he had killed himself.’

  ‘And the . . . this started right after that?’

  ‘Depends what you mean by right after,’ she said. ‘The following Hallowe’en, certainly. And every Hallowe’en since.’ She lit a fresh cigarette. ‘I’ve tried everything I could think of to get it off my back, but nothing works. So in the end, it’s been more like damage limitation. Luckily it’s only one night per year; the rest of the time it doesn’t affect me. But . . .’ She sighed. ‘How I used to love the autumn. I do miss that, Iain. I dread it now.’

  We made small talk for a while longer, until I saw the clock’s hands inching towards eight and exchanged glances with M
ildred. She took a deep breath and nodded. ‘Right. Hang on.’ Puffing the last of her latest cigarette to its filter, she stubbed it out, then drained the last of the coffee I’d brewed her at a gulp. When she looked at me, she was fighting to keep her gaze and voice steady. ‘Let’s go.’

  I held the door open for her, then switched off the lights, closing it softly behind us.

  The creaking of the stair-boards as we ascended was loud in the quiet of the settled house, and the shadows seemed as deep and dark as long-forgotten, overgrown wells, all filled with lurking, menacing things. Just atmosphere, I thought, drumming it into my mind. Everything about tonight is making you suggestible. It’s just a house and Aunt Mildred is just a nice old lady with an unfortunate problem. That’s what Rachel probably called it, what Mildred called it, an unfortunate problem. Like incontinence or a tendency to fart loudly in church. Just a little more embarrassing and to be avoided in discussion, but, at least, occurring much more rarely. Only once a year, in fact. A large number of incontinents and flatulents would envy that. I wondered if Aunt Mildred envied them.

  I opened the bedroom door and closed it behind us. Mildred lay down on the bed, limbs akimbo to form an X.

  It was an old bed, with a sturdy brass frame, tall thick posts at each corner, around each of which was attached one bracelet of a pair of handcuffs. I crossed to the head of the bed and snapped the first bracelet closed around her right wrist. The bracelet was well-padded; struggling would cause it to tighten. I asked Mildred to pull as hard as she could so that it would do so, and then asked if she was comfortable. She told me that she was. That was as good a test as I could manage under the circumstances, so I then went on to repeat the process on her other wrist and then, crossing down to the bed’s foot, both her ankles.

  It was almost eight o’clock. I propped the pillows under her head and ensured that she was comfortable.

  ‘Is there anything else I need to know?’ I asked politely, struck by the absurdity of the whole scene. What an onlooker would make of it I dreaded to think.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Mildred. ‘Rachel has told you what to expect. Have you any questions? If so, now’s the time to ask them.’

  I shook my head. ‘Good,’ she said, and sighed. ‘I wish I understood my father better. It might make this easier if I could understand it, but there’s so much left out. Sometimes I think he never really understood himself, that he can’t find peace even in death. As though’—she yawned—‘as though he’s been haunting me all these years.’ She yawned again; her eyelids fluttered. With an effort she forced them open and looked at me.

  ‘The gag, please,’ she said.

  I applied it. I drew up a chair, and sat beside the low chest of drawers at the bedside. On it lay an ash tray and a full pack of Lucky Strikes—a gift to me from Rachel, who knew of my fondness for them. I lit one and waited.

  The room was bathed in the warm yellow glow from the unshaded light bulb hanging from the ceiling. Set into the wall the bedhead rested against, six feet behind me over my shoulder, was a window overlooking the tiny backyard. Like most backyards on terraced houses in these parts, it backed out onto a ginnel behind the terrace, bounded by a high wall and a wooden gate. It was used to keep the wheely-bin in. Orange sodium light washed down the ginnel.

  I drew the thin curtain shut and sat back, tapping ash lightly into the tray.

  At exactly seven minutes past eight, Mildred’s eyelids began fluttering again, then closed, and she couldn’t be roused. That was no surprise; Rachel had told me that it was impossible to prevent her slipping into this trance-like fugue-state by any means.

  By 8.07 and thirty seconds I could see her eyeballs weaving under her tissue-thin lids, to and fro in the unmistakable motions of REM. A few seconds later, she moved once, violently, a short convulsive spasm that twisted her body into a frightening angle. A trapped whimper came from her throat.

  Another jolt, and a short, stifled cry. As though she’d just heard a terrible noise in a night-quiet house and been made to leap in shock.

  Mildred began to jerk and wriggle on the bed.

  I stubbed out my cigarette.

  Mildred gave another cry. I knew that she wasn’t quite literally reliving the events of that terrible night. It was more of a combination of flashback and nightmare, with her father slaughtering and slaughtering on and on, and working his way, slowly and relentlessly, to her.

  This went on for ten or fifteen minutes. By then, Mildred was thrashing violently. Muffled attempts at words escaped the gag. I caught something that could have been either ‘Arthur’ or ‘Father’.

  Then, with a soft ‘ping’, the light bulb blew out, plunging the room into near-darkness. Orange light oozed thickly in through the curtained window, offering the only illumination. Mildred’s thrashings on the bed filled the room with the sound of rumpling cloth, rattling handcuff-chains, and the light ring of the bracelets against the brass bedposts.

  Something had changed; something about the room had grown strange, had become not quite right. What was it? Then I realised. The light coming in through the windows was changing colour. It was turning from orange to a clear, silvery white, like that of a moon alone in an otherwise clear and lightless sky.

  I rose slowly, and began walking towards the window. I reached for the curtain. Behind me, something else changed; an absence, not a presence. Yes; Mildred had stopped thrashing, and whimpering. I could just hear her muted breathing, as though she was trying to conceal herself.

  There was a soft sound, like tree branches gently soughing in a low wind. A gentle creaking. Like stair-boards in a settling house. I pulled the curtain wide open.

  And stood there, blinking.

  The backyard, the ginnel, the wheely-bin—none of these things were there. Nor was there a single streetlight to be seen. All I could see—impossibly—from the upstairs window of that terraced house was a reasonably wide, green lawn. In its centre stood two saplings, both silver birch.

  Outside the bedroom door, I could hear the creaking. It was louder, as though closer, or as though something grown a little heavier was pressing down on the boards. Or perhaps both.

  Mildred’s breathing accelerated. I tore my gaze from the impossible lawn and looked out over her dim-lit, slumbering figure, and then towards the closed bedroom door. The creaking was louder.

  ‘Mildred,’ I croaked. What time was it? Rachel had said that just as the fits always started at exactly the same time, they ended at the same time. She hadn’t mentioned anything else, any of this. Was this normal?

  The creaking sounded again. This time one creak was so loud it sounded like a mouse or rat squeaking. It was getting nearer to the door.

  ‘Mildred!’

  Now I could hear something else. A soft tinkling noise. Like wind-chimes.

  ‘Mildred!’

  The next creak gave way to a crack, like a knot bursting in a wood fire, as something heavy leaned on one of the stairs.

  A pitiful, trapped noise came from Mildred. I opened my mouth to shout again.

  The light flashed on. I stared up at it in disbelief. I had seen it blow out.

  It . . .

  Slowly, I made myself turn around, walk towards the window. I looked out onto the backyard, the ginnel, the blessed glow of streetlamps.

  Mildred was crying softly. The handcuff key was in the top drawer of the chest. I undid the bracelets one by one.

  Something creaked. I spun round. As I did, the door swung open. Beyond it, the empty staircase gaped like a dark, hollow throat, gorged with blackness.

  It was a long time before either of us found the courage to venture down it.

  Rachel returned at about eleven o’clock. By then, Mildred was tucked up securely in bed, nightmare at an end for another year. I had smoked most of the pack of Lucky Strikes, and was thinking that Rachel had better have more cigarettes.

  As it turned out, she did, two more packs. She laid them on the table in front of me.

  �
��Thank you,’ she said.

  I didn’t answer. What the hell was I supposed to say? Tomorrow, when the sun came up, I’d go back round and speak to her properly. But tonight . . .

  But I looked at her, and I thought how Rachel had done this, endured this, night after night, year after year. That bond was there now, and always would be; we knew it, both of us, without needing to speak.

  It was almost midnight when I left, starting towards my own house, a few doors down from theirs.

  As I did, I heard a faint noise. A soft scrape, like a foot on stone, and a light tinkle.

  Like wind-chimes.

  When I looked around, the street was empty.

  I ran the rest of the way home, and locked the door firmly behind me.

  The Wedding

  JULIANA’S PHONE RANG EARLY that morning, long before dawn. Moaning, she dragged herself out of bed and staggered over to it. Better be good, she thought.

  Most people in this city were frightened by anything that roused them from their beds at this hour. But it wasn’t usually a phone call. They didn’t politely request your presence at the Ministry for Internal Security, or wherever, by telephone. They knocked on your door and kicked it down if you didn’t respond with sufficient speed.

  Besides which, Juliana often thought, she was beyond fear now. Though perhaps no one ever really was; perhaps one look at a government torture cell, with the instruments set out all ready, and she’d rediscover its presence in her. But right now, there was nothing. Hadn’t been for over a year. Not since . . .

  Before she picked up the phone, which continued relentlessly to ring, she rubbed the sleep from her eyes to clear them, and looked at the framed picture that stood beside the phone. Just in case it was the last time she would ever see it, in case this might be the call that summoned her into a night and fog from which she would not return.