Christmas Dinner of Souls

by Ross Montgomery

  ‘There you go, gentlemen!’ he said. ‘Everything I owe, plus interest. Merry Christmas.’

  The gangsters left, puzzled and slightly disappointed. Just like that, Mortimer was debt-free – and he had barely even scratched the surface of his new wealth.

  Mortimer had been due to spend Christmas morning with his family, but he didn’t much see the point in doing that any more. Instead, he filled a suitcase with money and set out for the poshest street in the city. It was a row of glorious mansion houses, each one more beautiful than the last. Mortimer knocked on the first door and a woman answered. She was wearing a nightgown and looked extremely irritated.

  ‘Sorry to bother you,’ said Mortimer. ‘I’d like to buy your house.’

  He held out a stack of banknotes a foot tall. The woman’s eyes boggled – but she shook her head.

  ‘Are you out of your mind? It’s Christmas morning! My children are opening their presents! I’m not going to kick them out in the middle of the street just because—’

  Mortimer doubled the stack of money in his hand.

  ‘Give me ten minutes,’ said the woman.

  In less than five, her children were standing on the pavement bawling their eyes out, and Mortimer was the new owner of their house.

  He didn’t stop there – he bought every house on the street, until the pavements were covered in weeping children. He smashed through all the walls connecting them so that his mansion stretched from one end of the street to the other. It was the biggest house in the city – and it was all his.

  Mortimer ordered a fleet of horse-drawn carriages to carry all the money from his library, and started to live like a king.

  *

  The next year passed in a blur. Mortimer was the richest man in the city – he wore the finest clothes, ate in the finest restaurants, and wore so much gold jewellery that he started to get backache from carrying it around all the time. Money left his hands in a constant stream – there seemed to be no end to his newfound wealth.

  But of course, there was an end to it. In twelve short months, his money dried up. It seemed to happen in an instant – one moment he was loaded, the next he was penniless. But it was even worse than that. On days when Mortimer had forgotten to bring his wallet – which happened often – he’d ask bars, casinos, restaurants and dog tracks to loan him money instead. They were only too happy to oblige – after all, Mortimer was the richest man in town. But now he was broke – again – and he owed thousands of pounds. Hundreds of thousands, in fact. He was in more debt than ever before.

  So it was that the following Christmas Eve, Mortimer found himself slumped in another armchair in another library, cradling another shotgun. Of course, this armchair was plusher, and the library was bigger, and the shotgun fired diamonds instead of bullets.

  ‘What have I done?’ cried Mortimer. ‘I should have confessed to my family when I had the chance – I haven’t even seen them in a year! Now I’m really done for!’

  ‘Perhaps I can be of help,’ said a voice.

  Mortimer turned round. The Devil was once again sitting in an armchair behind him, drinking whisky. But Mortimer couldn’t help noticing that the Devil looked different this time. He was taller – twice Mortimer’s height, in fact. He towered over the chair he sat in like a hawk in a sparrow’s nest. The smoke that billowed from his collar was darker than before.

  ‘Oh, Devil!’ cried Mortimer. ‘You have to help me – the money you gave me wasn’t enough! I need more!’

  ‘Why didn’t you ask sooner, Mortimer?’ said the Devil. ‘That can be easily fixed.’

  Mortimer gulped. ‘But … will it be the same deal this time? You don’t want my soul?’

  ‘I only want to help, Mortimer,’ said the Devil kindly.

  Mortimer breathed a sigh of relief.

  ‘Good! Then fill up this library with money again – and this time, give me all I’ll ever need so I can never run out!’

  The Devil nodded, rippling the black smoke.

  ‘Your choice, Mortimer.’

  And just like that, Mortimer woke up. He couldn’t believe his eyes. The vast library was packed with gold and jewellery, right up to the rafters. He had never seen so much money in his life – a hundred men living a hundred lifetimes could never hope to spend it.

  So Mortimer decided to try.

  He stopped going out to fancy restaurants – instead, he bought every chef in the city and paid for them to live in his house. Each evening, they’d present him with a variety of meals – Mortimer would choose one he wanted and throw the other two hundred away. Instead of spending his nights at dog tracks and casinos, Mortimer had his own dog track and casino installed in the mansion, complete with hundreds of people paid an hourly wage to stand around looking like they were having a good time. Mortimer installed his own cinemas, ice rinks, fairgrounds and theatres right beside him, and when he ran out of space, Mortimer simply bought every house in the next street and smashed through the walls.

  As Mortimer’s house grew bigger, so too did Mortimer. All that fine dining made him enormous, and within a few months he was so fat that he couldn’t walk around his mansion any more – instead, he sat on his pile of gold like a sultan and made people come to him. He’d throw money when he liked them, and throw money at them when he was bored.

  Soon, another Christmas arrived. Mortimer was celebrating this one in style, eating a whole roast goose by himself while thousands of hired guests cheered and praised him.

  ‘Mortimer’s the best!’

  ‘Three cheers for Mortimer!’

  ‘Have you lost weight, Mortimer?’

  Mortimer took another huge bite of goose – and choked. His eyes grew wide, and his face turned bright red. He tumbled from the pile of money and collapsed on the floor, clutching at his chest.

  ‘Hey! What’s wrong with old fatty?’ said one of his guests.

  ‘He’s having a heart attack!’ said another. ‘What do we do?’

  ‘Quick!’ said the first one. ‘Grab as much money as you can before he dies!’

  Mortimer’s fake friends piled wads of cash into their pockets and scattered from the house like rats, leaving him to perish on the floor. Mortimer lay alone, gasping his final breaths in the empty room.

  ‘Please!’ he cried. ‘Someone! Anyone!’

  ‘Perhaps I can be of help,’ said a voice.

  Mortimer looked up, his face dripping with sweat. On the other side of the enormous room sat the Devil, back in his old armchair – but once again, he looked different. The chair had become red-hot embers where he touched it. The smoke that poured out of his collar was now deepest black, filling the room like a volcano.

  ‘Devil!’ cried Mortimer. ‘Oh, you have to help me – I’m dying!’

  ‘I can see that, Mortimer,’ said the Devil. ‘How much money would you like this time?’

  Mortimer shook his head. ‘No! I don’t want any more money – I want life!’

  The Devil shook his head. ‘I’m afraid I can’t do that, Mortimer. It’s your time to go.’

  Mortimer’s eyes widened with horror.

  ‘Please – I just want another day! Enough to see my family again and ask for their forgiveness! I’ll give you whatever you want – anything!’

  The Devil chuckled. ‘And what do you have that I might possibly want, Mortimer?’

  Mortimer swallowed hard. He knew the answer.

  ‘I … I’ll give you my immortal soul!’

  The Devil paused. ‘Your soul, you say?’

  Mortimer nodded. ‘Yes – it’s all yours! Just don’t let me die!’

  The Devil gave a deep sigh, and stood up from the armchair. He made his way across the room towards Mortimer, growing taller and taller with every step. The smoke that billowed from his neck grew blacker and thicker, pouring up into the ceiling like a waterfall; his elegant suit burned to ashes. The lights in the room went out one by one as he passed them.

  ‘I’m afraid that won’t do, Mortimer,’
said the Devil, his voice growing louder and louder. ‘You see – your soul is mine already. You gave it to me a long time ago.’

  Mortimer gasped. ‘No … We had a deal! You said the money was free! You said you weren’t going to take my soul!’

  The Devil laughed. ‘Clever boy, aren’t you Mortimer? I never took your soul – you gave it to me willingly.’

  The Devil stood over him. Mortimer could see his entire body was covered in thick, coarse hair, and his bright white hands had sharpened into terrible claws. He was so tall that his smoking head touched the ceiling.

  ‘I gave you more money than you ever needed. Did you give it to those that did? No. Did you use it to make a difference to the world? NO. Did you return to your family, who gave you everything they had? NO! You used the money to turn yourself into a bully, a sloth and a tyrant. I didn’t have to do a thing, Mortimer – you handed me your soul on a platter!’

  The Devil crouched down low, until Mortimer’s face stung and sizzled with the heat that roared off him. Mortimer tried to turn away, but it was too late – he was dying. When the Devil next spoke, his voice was as loud as a thunderstorm.

  ‘It was your choice, Mortimer. And you chose Hell.’

  The smoke parted, and with his dying breath Mortimer finally saw the Devil’s face that had lain hidden behind the smoke all this time.

  It was his own, staring back at him.

  The guests howled with delight once more. Lewis stood at the edge of the room, his heart pounding. He couldn’t believe how happy these people were to hear such horrible stories – the more unpleasant the tale, the happier they seemed.

  ‘Great stuff, Wallmanner!’ said the Dean. ‘A classic tale with a family connection – that’s sure to win you some extra points!’

  Lady Arabella shifted angrily in her chair.

  ‘Pah! My story was ten times better than that piece of claptrap!’

  Wallmanner shot her a furious look. ‘No one cares what you think, you fat old hag!’

  Before Lady Arabella could respond, Wallmanner had already leapt onto the table and kicked a whole jug of gravy over her. Lady Arabella shrieked – on cue, her dogs flew at the guests, snapping at their ankles. Within seconds the whole table was at each other’s throats, clawing and biting one another.

  Lewis was stunned. The guests had turned on each other in an instant – only the Dean stayed in his chair, staring at them in shock. He leapt to his feet.

  ‘STOP!’

  The fighting stopped instantly.

  ‘YOU KNOW THE RULES!’ bellowed the Dean. ‘The best story is decided at the end of the night! We stick to the rules laid down by Edgar Caverner, or we fall apart. We’re here to destroy Christmas – not each other!’

  The guests muttered in agreement and returned sheepishly to their chairs. The Dean glared at Retch and Lady Arabella with a look that could burn through glass.

  ‘Now, spit and make up.’

  The two guests reluctantly spat on each other and sat back down. Was that an apology? Lewis was disgusted.

  But at the same time, he was hatching a plan. A plan to escape from the College alive.

  ‘Now let’s get back to what really matters – our night of stories!’ The Dean lifted the next bauble and smashed it on the table. ‘Our next tale is from Sir Algernon Thoroughbred-Pilt, High Master of Flogging!’

  The clock struck two, and the kitchen doors swung open. Balanced in the Cook’s hands was a giant gingerbread house, decorated with icing and lollipops and hard candy windowpanes. Lewis grabbed it and placed it on the table before anyone could take a swipe at his head.

  ‘A gingerbread house?’ said the Dean, unimpressed. ‘Care to explain yourself, Pilt? This is a Dinner of Souls, not a children’s tea party!’

  The man in the filthy pinstripe suit and broken bowler hat stood up. He was covered from head to toe in heavy gold chains: one hung from the monocle jammed in his eye, and a dozen more swung from his pockets. There was even one attached to the club he carried in his belt.

  ‘A house’s exterior can never be trusted, Dean,’ Sir Algernon Thoroughbred-Pilt said calmly. ‘Remember that a wall can hide a great many evils. People so rarely choose to look beyond them.’

  He removed the front of the gingerbread house, revealing the scene inside. The guests gasped: it was a gingerbread torture chamber, with a pastry executioner wielding a sharpened candy cane. In front of him a helpless jelly baby victim dangled over a cauldron of hot chocolate sauce.

  ‘This is no dusty family story,’ announced Sir Algernon, shooting a glance at Retch Wallmanner. ‘This happened to a close friend of mine, one Christmas Eve not so long ago. I tell it to you exactly as he told it to me …’

  He plucked the gingerbread executioner out of the house and chewed on its head thoughtfully as he told his grisly tale.

  The Kensington System

  I was driving to my aunt’s house one Christmas Eve when my car broke down. The timing couldn’t have been worse – I was alone, in the middle of nowhere, and it was already dark. Snow was falling so heavily that I could barely see ten feet ahead of me. I wandered down the road, shivering as I searched for any sign of life – and to my relief, found a set of iron gates.

  They led to a mansion – a mansion that, even through the snow and darkness, I could see was brutally ugly. It may have once been beautiful, but over time something had warped it. Still, I had little choice: the snow was getting heavier every second. I raced to the door and rang the bell.

  It was some time before the door opened. When it did, I was confronted by an old man – at least, I think he was old. He looked like wet newspaper left out to dry on a skeleton.

  ‘Can I help you?’ he said, his voice no more than a croak.

  I smiled nervously. ‘My car broke down outside. I was wondering if I could use your phone to—’

  ‘The nearest phone is in town,’ he said. ‘Ten miles away. Your best bet is to walk there in the morning when the storm has passed.’

  My face fell. ‘Tomorrow? But it’s Christmas Eve! My aunt—’

  ‘It would be a pleasure to have you, sir,’ said the man, leading me inside. ‘We rarely have guests nowadays at Kensington Manor.’

  I could see why – the house was even more miserable on the inside. The walls were covered in dust and the carpet disintegrated beneath my feet. But the worst part of all was the feeling in the house. It was like something terrible had happened there a long time ago – something which still hadn’t left.

  ‘My name is Jasper,’ said the man. ‘I look after Kensington Manor by myself nowadays. I can tell you all about its rich history tomorrow morning!’

  The last thing I wanted to do was spend Christmas Eve in that horrible house – but there was no point in refusing. Besides, I could always get up early and leave before Jasper woke up – I’d be at my aunt’s in time for Christmas breakfast.

  Jasper led me to my bedroom, a tiny box with four walls, no windows, and an old damp bed.

  ‘The master suite,’ he said grandly. ‘You’ll be quite comfortable here, sir. Scream if you need anything.’

  ‘I’m sure I’ll be fine,’ I said.

  Jasper showed me his teeth. It took me a while before I realised he was smiling.

  ‘I’m sure,’ he said, and closed the door.

  I gazed at the dismal room and shuddered. A prison cell would have been cosier. For a brief moment, I even considered going back outside to spend the night in my car – then I remembered how cold it was.

  ‘Just go to sleep,’ I muttered to myself. ‘You’ll be out of here soon.’

  I clambered into my damp bed, turned off the lights, and waited for sleep to come.

  *

  The sound woke me at midnight.

  I sat bolt upright. My room was pitch black. I couldn’t see my own hand in front of my face. Outside, the storm was raging at the windowpanes – but I could hear another sound beneath it.

  Scrape, scrape, scrape.

  It w
as coming from the wall behind me.

  I flew out of the bed. I wasn’t imagining it: there was something scratching at my bedroom wall. But this was no trapped rat in the wall space. I was listening to the slow, desperate scrape of human fingernails. I could even track them as they moved in the darkness – scrape, scrape, scrape, from one side of the room to the other …

  And that wasn’t all I could hear. There was a voice, too.

  ‘Please … please …’

  I stood stock-still, my heart pounding. The scraping moved down the hallway, growing quieter and quieter. Then it simply faded into silence.

  I didn’t dare move – I barely dared to breathe. I knew what I had heard – there was someone trapped in the walls of Kensington Manor.

  But how was that possible …?

  When I finally felt brave enough to move, I turned on my bedside lamp and dressed frantically. It was no good – I wasn’t going to spend another second in that awful house. I turned to grab my bag—

  And stopped. There was something on the table beside me – something I hadn’t noticed earlier. A book, its cover as dark and grim as the wood it rested on. The front read:

  The Secret Diary of Eliza

  Kensington

  I don’t know why I did it. I don’t know why I didn’t just run. But something deep down told me that the book was important. Something told me that this would explain everything: this would reveal the secret of the scraping in the walls. I picked up the book and opened its brown, curling pages. Inside was line after line of frantic, spidery handwriting:

  If you are reading this diary, then know two things: my name is Eliza Kensington, and I am being kept prisoner in my own house.

  My heart raced. It was the hidden diary of a young girl, written almost a hundred years ago.

  I do not know what is going to happen to me, but a terrible crime is being committed here at Kensington Manor. If I do not leave this note, then maybe my terrible fate will never be discovered – maybe all my suffering will be for nothing!