The Darkest Part Of The Woods

by Ramsey Campbell

  It was the wind, he told himself, though it sounded more like the irregular breaths of an entity that was trying to come to life. Even when Sam floundered onto his back and raised his head out of the darkness that the visions seemed to have lodged in his mind, it did. He widened his hot sluggish sticky eyes until his sight managed to separate the outlines of the contents of his room from the rest of the dimness, but the familiar disorder failed to ward off the notion that he was trapped in a dream or that the dream was real. He fumbled to dislodge the tangled sweaty quilt and sat on the edge of the bed, massaging some of an ache out of his leg, before limping to the window.

  As he leaned across the desk to peer through the glass he felt as if the night had exhaled an unhealthily warm sweetish breath in his face. It was only a hint of the wind that set the treetops beyond the common groping for the darkness overhead that no amount of stars could relieve. The vast distant chorus sounded more like a secretive whisper now, but was that wholly outside the house? He eased the sash down until wood met wood, then raised his head and risked closing his eyes while he strained to hear.

  There was a noise in the house. Perhaps it was the sound of someone, not necessarily as few as one, rather more than breathing in their sleep. He picked his unsteady way across the cluttered floor and took all the time he needed to edge the door silently open. As soon as it moved he heard somebody snoring with a discretion that bordered on elegance.

  If it was his mother, he hoped she would keep it up. So long as he could hear she was asleep he would take the chance to venture into Sylvia's room, though he wasn't sure if he wanted to find her awake. When he stepped onto the landing he could tell it was his mother who was snoring. Something else was audible, if barely, in his aunt's room. Pressing an ear against an upper panel didn't let him identify it, and so he took hold of the unexpectedly warm doorknob with both hands to ease the door inward.

  Perhaps the sound had come from the forest—her window was open wide—but he couldn't shake off a conviction that more than trees had been responsible for the furtive murmur. He sidled past the door and limped into the unlit room. His aunt was lying face up on the bed. So much of her was a dark lump that he could have imagined the mound on which she'd taken him had grown within her. It was his child, he thought, his child, but the concept seemed more than his mind could encompass. He was peering past the bulk of her, and had just succeeded in discerning that she was asleep, when he grew aware of being watched from somewhere in the darkness.

  The only movement he could locate was on the far side of the common. He limped to the window with as much reluctance as stealth, and the smell of Selcouth's journal rose to meet him. Just now he preferred not to recall any of the passages Sylvia had read to him. As he ducked towards the gap beneath the sash, a wind intensified the ancient smell that could have been of the book or of the woods or both. At the same time the glimmering trees made a concerted gesture that might have heralded a revelation. He was struggling to grasp what he ought to understand when his sense of being watched returned. The watcher was behind him.

  He twisted around, almost falling against his grandfather's desk as his bad leg threatened not to keep up. Though his aunt's eyes were closed, she was mouthing in her sleep. He couldn't deduce her words, and was glad of it while he was conscious of being observed, perhaps not with eyes, from somewhere darker than the room. There was no point in trying to deny that the watcher was in front of him, on the bed. The knowledge paralysed him, and then it sent him out so fast that the room appeared to stagger around him.

  He was forcing himself to linger until the door had been inched shut when he heard Sylvia mumble in her sleep. "Not yet, Natty," he thought she said, and "Not dark enough."

  Whatever else she pronounced or came close to pronouncing was rendered unintelligible by the intervention of the door. Sam loitered only briefly before fleeing to his room and crawling into bed. No visions lay in wait for him. He was wondering uneasily whether they'd ceased because they or something related to them had succeeded in making a point when their absence let exhaustion catch up with him. For perhaps another second he was aware merely of the dark, and then not of that either.

  No time at all seemed to pass before he was roused by a light someone was shining into the darkness to find him. She was calling to him. Once he began to understand her words they wrenched him further awake. "Are you staying down there all day?" she said.

  At first he didn't know where he was or who. He forced his cumbersome eyelids open to see Sylvia looming over him. Her patient face appeared to be perched birdlike on top of her increased bulk. The light that was the sun beyond the window at her back showed Sam his room, but nevertheless he stammered "Down where?"

  "In your lair." Presumably observing his confusion, she tried "In your bed."

  "I couldn't sleep."

  She gave that a smile of amused disbelief. There was no point in arguing when they had far more crucial issues to discuss. "What were you—what do you want?" he mumbled, still less than awake.

  "Someone's come to see you."

  His mind shrank from the possibility that she meant her child—their child, a notion that he wished the daylight could reveal to be a bad and grotesque dream.

  "Who?" he found himself able only to whisper.

  "Can't you hear?"

  She couldn't be inviting him to listen for the sounds he'd overheard in the night, he thought or tried to think. All the same, as he shoved himself upright against the pillow he felt as though he was recoiling, and not just from her. He had to drag his mind free of the idea to be capable of hearing voices downstairs, his mother's and a man's. "Who is it?" he had to ask.

  "Mr. Harvey, Mr. Harvey."

  He didn't know when he'd last been called that. If he'd had time he might have wondered whether he was even sure of his own name, but he was too busy wanting to learn "What's he saying?"

  "Sounds a tad serious."

  His father's voice had grown lower and more intense, and Sam didn't need to hear the words to guess the subject was himself. "I'll tell him you'll be on your way, shall I?" Sylvia said.

  Sam heard his mother's voice sink to meet his father's, presumably in disagreement. He couldn't think when he might have a better opportunity to talk to Sylvia without the risk of being overheard. "Wait," he pleaded.

  From turning away she swung completely around and back to him, so that he imagined her midriff or its tenant acting like the needle of a compass. "Yes,

  Sam?"

  He took a breath only to have to swallow. It felt as though all the questions he might ask were shrinking into him. As Sylvia raised her eyebrows and parted her lips he managed to say "Will you tell me something?"

  "Anything I know."

  "When was the first time you saw me the age I am now?"

  An expression that might have been some kind of smile flicker across her mouth before she said "Could be this very morning couldn't it?"

  "Grown up, I mean. When did you see me grown up?"

  "Last year."

  "When last year?"

  "Are you asking for a date?"

  The possibility that she was gently mocking him infuriated Sam. "No," he not much less than snarled, "I'm asking when was the first time we—got together."

  "What would Heather say?"

  That put him in mind of being found out by his mother, and made him blurt "In her library."

  "Are you saying she's wrong?"

  "Wouldn't you?"

  He heard how accusing his tone had become, but couldn't think of any other way to sound, although disbelief was catching up with him—disbelief that they could be talking or rather not talking about what he fancied they were. He was struggling not to apologise or to concede the verbal game when Sylvia's expression owned up to itself She contrived to look both suddenly aged and much younger as she murmured "What do you think you've remembered, Sam?"

  "I don't just think, I know."

  She glanced downwards, and he might have suspected that
she was seeking instructions from the bulk of herself if he hadn't heard his parents arguing beneath her feet. Their voices seemed trapped by the floorboards—as trapped as he felt while he awaited his aunt's response. "Then do you think there could be a better time and place to talk about it?" she said.

  "I want to now."

  That wasn't just childish, it wasn't even true. It had been forced out of him by the realisation that until she'd spoken, his disbelief had remained a hope too secret to admit to himself. He could only watch as her face took its expression back.

  "So talk," she said.

  He made his mouth open without the least idea what might emerge. If it hadn't been for recognising how stupid he must look, he might have clung to his silence. As it was, he faltered. "Did I ..."

  "What, Sam?" she said with a hint of a smile.

  "Did we. Did we . .."

  His harshness trailed off, but it had driven her smile into hiding "Yes," she said blank-faced.

  "You're saying," he stammered in a last attempt at incredulity "you're saying we . . ."

  "I'm saying only you and I know who the father is," said Sylvia, her gaze drifting inwards or downwards or both. "Except Natty will, of course."

  That had to be years in the future, Sam told himself, and there was a far more immediate threat. "You won't tell anyone else, will you? he pleaded.

  "Wouldn't you want them to know?"

  "Christ, what do you think?"

  Her gaze took its time over finding him. The last expression he would have anticipated glimpsing in her eyes was hurt, and it made him more nervous still.

  "As the father likes," she said.

  "Promise?"

  "Nobody's going to learn who it was from me. There, will that help you sleep nights?"

  Sam had to make an effort not to feel convicted of being a bad father. "Maybe nothing will," he muttered.

  "If there's anything else I can do to help -"

  She must have sensed his inward wince, because she marched with some haughtiness to the door. "I'd better announce you," she said primly. "Mr. Harvey must be wondering what's keeping you."

  Even more disconcerting than her adoption of the role of a concerned relative was his sense that she thought it only reasonable and expected him to think so too. He didn't move until she began to plod downstairs, at which point he emerged from the refuge of the quilt and limped fast to grab his robe from the hook on the door, feeling painfully conscious of his nakedness. He'd just ventured onto the landing when his father called "Is that someone coming to life at last?"

  "Something like that," Sam mumbled and dodged into the bathroom, where he was afraid he might be sick. Instead he had to watch his penis empty itself, his treacherous tube of flesh that had failed to recognise his aunt except as an irresistible partner. At least now her pregnancy stood between him and her attractiveness. Once he'd finished watching himself drip he was confronted by his face in the mirror. He couldn't think when he'd last seen anything that had less to say to him. When his meaninglessness sent him out of the room, his father called "Are you joining us now?"

  "Depends who us is," Sam muttered, but seemed to have no other option than to trudge downstairs.

  "I hope nobody thinks I'm unapproachable. You can tell me whatever you like."

  His father had lowered his voice. For a dreadful moment Sam imagined that the invitation was addressed to Sylvia, and nearly lost his footing in his haste to limp downstairs. She and his mother were indeed with his father in the front room. His mother looked ready to defend Sam, but Sylvia's face was keeping its plans to itself. His father barely waited for Sam to enter the room before he said "Here you are, sit down. Let's feel at ease if we can."

  Sam's mother gave that an askance blink suggesting she thought his father had forgotten whose house this was, then turned to Sylvia. "We'll leave them to talk, shall we?"

  Sylvia was lowering herself beside Sam's father on the couch. "Isn't this for the whole family to hear?" she said as she settled her bulk or it settled on her.

  "You won't mind that, will you, old chap? It can help to have someone with a different perspective around when you've a problem to solve."

  "I don't see how."

  "I wouldn't expect you to till we've given it a try," his father said with just a flash of sharpness. "Apologies to anyone if they've heard it all before, but off you go, Sam. Tell us exactly what happened yesterday, only do sit down first for heaven's sake. I'm always scared you'll topple over since you fell out of your tree."

  Sam dropped himself into an armchair. "I told you."

  "I want to hear it all from you. I didn't understand half what I heard on the phone."

  "Then you couldn't have been listening properly," Sam's mother said.

  "Let Sam talk."

  His father said this with a trace of weariness she could have taken as quite an insult, and Sam felt compelled to respond before she did. "lost my way, that's all."

  "Give it some consideration, old chap. That won't be all you'll be telling Fay

  Sheridan, will it?"

  "I don't know what to say except the truth."

  "Nothing but the whole of it. That's what we're waiting to hear.'

  As Sam flinched inwardly at the prospect his father sat forward clapping a hand on either thigh. "So where was the problem really What are we going to tell Fay after she was expecting so much?"

  "Maybe she shouldn't have been."

  "Does anyone else think we're hearing the problem? You won't get far by underrating yourself, Sam. Everyone here thinks you are, don't they?"

  "I don't believe anybody could overrate you, Sam," his mother said

  Sam was preoccupied with dreading that his aunt would join in and she did.

  "There's more to him than most people realise."

  That brought the whole truth close to escaping his lips. It felt as though an insect was writhing inside them. As he did his utmost to swallow, his father insisted "Nobody's asking more of you than you're capable of, old chap. Fay wouldn't be, so I don't understand why you're looking like that."

  No doubt Sam's fear of knowing how he looked did his expression no favours, which might have been why his mother said "Terry, if you could just -"

  "Anything except not find out what exactly happened so it can't again," Sam's father said and pointed his upturned hands at Sam. "I know one thing you didn't tell me."

  Sam glimpsed secret amusement in his aunt's eyes—amusement that he was dismayed to realise she wanted him to share. He glanced hastily away but still felt watched, and by more watchers than he could see. He only just accomplished enough of a swallow to croak "What?"

  "Where you got lost."

  "On the way."

  "You know, I believe I could have figured that out for myself. Where on it?"

  "The second junction on the motorway."

  "Second from where?"

  "Home." I

  "You're saying what, ten miles from here?"

  "More like fifteen."

  "It's a deal. I'll give you fifteen," Sam's father said, then let his jaw' drop in case the mirthless joke had lacked obviousness. "You won't ask Fay to accept you forgot where you were going so close to home and straight along the motorway as well. I'm sure nobody here can."

  "I can," Sylvia said.

  "You'll tell me how. What do you know about him that I don't and it looks as if his mother doesn't either?"

  Sam saw his aunt part her lips with the tip of her tongue. He was righting to draw a breath while he thought of an interruption when his father lost more patience. "Is he on drugs?"

  "Are you, Sam?" his mother said as if the direct question was an offer she was making him.

  "No."

  "Then what?" his father demanded. "What do you need to tell us?"

  Abruptly Sam had had enough. That aspect of the truth was more than he could be bothered keeping to himself. "I can't leave here," he said.

  "Of course you can," his father protested, so immediately he hadn'
t time to sound impatient. "It'll be easier for you than it was for me."

  "I never said it was easy for you, but you wanted to go, didn't you?"

  "Are you saying you don't want to make anything of yourself?"

  The question and indeed the entire argument seemed dwarfed into insignificance by the visions that had come to Sam in the night. "All I'm saying is that's you," he said, and in a desperate attempt to lessen the scrutiny he was enduring

  "It isn't us."

  "Hold on, old chap, I think that's a bit much. You can't use these ladies as an excuse for hanging about. Your mother wants to stay near Margo, maybe your aunt does as well, and anyway you know why Sylvia wouldn't want to venture far just now. Only forgive me if I'm blunt, but that's got nothing to do with you, has it? There's no way you'll be involved, so there's no point in making it sound as if the family's the reason why you won't move yourself."

  Sam gazed hot-eyed at him in a vain attempt to render himself unaware of Sylvia.

  "It's only you who's making out I did."

  "So what reason are you giving us?"

  "I told you, I can't leave. Something won't let me." As he spoke he grasped how true that was, which dismayed him so much he tried to take some of it back. "My mind," he said.

  "Please promise me you won't say that to Fay Sheridan."

  "You're talking as if this is all about this Fay woman," Sam's mother objected.

  "It seems to me it's about Sam."

  "Let's leave Fay out of it by all means."

  "I won't ask if your relationship with her has to do with more than Sam."

  "You can. It has."

  "And was he supposed to help that?"

  "You're asking if I used him to attract her, is that what I'm hearing?"

  "You'll hear what you choose to hear, Terry, and it wouldn't be the first or the dozenth time either."

  Sam might have been grateful that their attention had wandered away from him if that hadn't left him more aware of Sylvia's. He sensed that he wasn't alone in finding the argument wholly irrelevant, beside some much greater point, and whose view was he sharing if not hers? "What's this got to do with anything?" he blurted.