You have done what was required.
“Does this apply to my father too, or just Stuart?”
But she didn’t answer that question either.
Soon the man you work for will go home. This time all will not go well for him. Go to his office now. See what has begun.
I opened his door and stepped in.
It felt eerie to see him sitting there, not moving, unaware of anything around him. His right hand was raised slightly, as if he had been caught in the act of turning a page.
I approached his desk.
I might have known. A gardening magazine. An article on cultivating roses had evidently caught his attention. Beside him I noticed some original artwork for a double-page spread for a large local car dealer. If that was for tomorrow, it would have to go to production within the next half hour. Good to see where the advertisement manager’s priorities lay.
Then I gasped. Creeping out from his shirtsleeve, his veins were rising, twisting, entangling, like roots entwining themselves around his wrist and hand. Only for a moment and then the vision faded.
I swallowed. A cold breeze wafted through the office. Goose bumps rose on my arms. I knew she was behind me. I could feel her. Smell her. Today, I wasn’t scared of her. Today she was doing as I asked.
My angel said nothing. She moved to a corner of the office behind him. Watching. Waiting. Then she spoke, Go back to your desk now. It has begun.
And I knew. Stuart would be going where my father had yet to follow. I felt nothing. No pity. No remorse. Just emptiness.
The corner was empty. My angel had gone. I felt exhausted, as if she’d drained energy from me.
I closed Stuart’s office door and, back at my desk, sank down on the chair. I put my head in my hands and waited.
Seconds later, the usual buzz was back. I lowered my hands and saw the office bustling with telesales staff, as if nothing happened.
I looked at my watch. Still eleven thirty. No time had passed. Had any of it even taken place? At that moment I didn’t even know reality from fantasy.
Five minutes later, Stuart tossed the artwork I’d seen into the tray bound for production. “I have an appointment with a client. I’ll be back tomorrow. Oh, and none of your tricks. Maurice knows I’m away for the rest of the day.”
That smug expression. He really thought he was untouchable. Funny, though, he didn’t seem to appreciate my smile.
In those days, most newspapers carried a heavy trade-union presence. At the Evening Telegraph, all the production staff were members of the NGA. The radical union had strict rules. Rules which everyone must obey or face the consequences.
Stuart had been a very naughty boy.
He’d broken a cardinal rule.
An angry production manager, Kevin Steele, marched up to my desk. He towered over me at six foot three. I hoped I hadn’t been the one to turn his face that particular shade of purple.
“Where is he?”
“Who? Stuart? He’s away until tomorrow, I’m afraid. Can I help?”
“Not unless you were the one who authorized non-NGA-approved artwork to be used in tomorrow’s paper.”
“What? Oh my God, I don’t know anything about that. Non-NGA-approved? Really?”
Kevin Steele had a voice as loud as his personality. The whole office stopped what it was doing and stared. Little flecks of white foam had formed at the corners of his lips. He was breathing hard and his words came out in short gasps. “That full page advertisement for Checkers’ Cars didn’t come from one of our members. My lads won’t touch it. Your boss tried to pull a fast one. He lied when he signed off on it. You’d better get hold of him. He’s got some explaining to do and, right now, you’ve got a double-page hole in tomorrow’s edition. As for today’s…forget it.”
I blinked. My mind raced. I knew perfectly well the chances of Stuart actually being on an appointment were slim on such a gloriously sunny day, but there was no way I was going to dig out his phone number and warn him. Besides, he had never let me have his number, so why should I search for it? Maurice would have it, though.
“I think we’d better go and see the General Manager” I said, praying he was in his office.
Thankfully, he was.
His face turned from a healthy pink to parchment white in under a minute.
“So where is Stuart now, Carly?”
“I believe he may be at home.”
Maurice stared at me. “Is he ill? He doesn’t have any leave booked today.”
I shrugged. “He said he’d told you he was going on an appointment.”
“But you believe he’s at home.”
I nodded.
Maurice stared at me for a moment and then reached for the phone. “Okay, Carly. I’ll ring him and get him back in here. Kevin, I’m sorry, we’ll get to the bottom of this.”
The production manager had calmed down, now that he was in front of the chief. “The lads are angry. Very angry. The agency name rang a bell with one of the compositors. It’s a tin pot, poxy little outfit in West Wycombe. Won’t allow unions. If it hadn’t been stopped and the NGA had heard about it, all our work would have been blackballed throughout the industry. You can’t imagine the trouble.”
“Oh, I’m afraid I can.” Maurice started dialing. “Carly, go and tell Chris McKenzie I need to see him urgently. Then get back to the office and make sure everyone stays calm. The last thing we need is a load of panicking women.”
I resisted the temptation to react to his remark.
Contrary to what he might have expected, everyone was almost uncannily calm. The telesales staff handled calls as usual.
Revenue had steadily increased since my much-criticized training session and regular one-to-one coaching. At least I had that success to flaunt with new employers I met. A recent interviewer at a newspaper in a town thirty-five miles away had perked up when I quoted that.
My phone rang.
“Carly, it’s Maurice. Could you come to my office, please?”
Chris and Kevin stood and left as I walked in. Chris smiled at me. Kevin’s mouth was still set in a firm line.
Maurice indicated a chair opposite him. “Please sit down, Carly. I’ll bring you up to speed.”
I sat down.
“Stuart has left the Evening Telegraph.”
“Really?”
Maurice nodded. I wanted to punch the air.
“His behavior constituted gross misconduct and the union wouldn’t have tolerated his presence anymore. As it is, we’ve lost an entire day’s revenue. There’ll be no Evening Telegraph today. If you could let admin know, and the trade advertisers will need to be informed, so if you could let the sales staff know too. I expect there’ll be a flood of complaints. Could you ask for volunteers to stay after hours? We’ll pay them, of course.”
“Of course,” I said and stood up, only for Maurice to wave me back down again.
“Just to let you know, I’m bringing Ray Dalston over from the Norfolk Herald to caretake as advertisement manager here.”
I didn’t know him, but felt relieved. For one awful moment, I’d thought he might ask me to stay, and I realized then that he could have offered me the world, with the moon as a side dish, and I would have turned him down. I couldn’t stay here. With just under five weeks left, the only thing preventing me from counting the days with joy was the prospect of being unemployed and having to confess all to my parents.
“That’s fine,” I said.
“Thanks, Carly.”
Now I could go. I paused at the door. “Could I ask… Did Stuart say why he’d done it? Signed off on the artwork, I mean.”
Maurice clasped his hands on the desk. “Strange, really. He insisted he knew nothing about it. He said the artwork had come to him with a sticker on it, showing an NGA-approved agency and relevant code. When I aske
d him why, if that were the case, he’d felt the need to sign off on it in the first place, he claimed not to know and said he thought someone had made a mistake in giving it to him. He couldn’t argue with his signature, though. I showed it to him and he seemed quite confused.”
The artwork was on Maurice’s desk, tossed to one side like the offending object it was.
I had to have a look. “May I see?”
“Help yourself.”
I picked up the sheets and turned them over. No NGA sticker. Just a code and Stuart’s signature. It was obvious that he’d written that code himself. He’d used a distinctive green pen he always used to sign off on anything. Another affectation. This one had cost him his job. My angel had seen to that.
I left Maurice’s office. At the end of the corridor, a shape moved, like smoke drifting in the breeze. The death stench of lilies wafted over to me. Fainter this time.
In the space of two days, I passed my driving test, took over temporary custody of a brand-new, white Vauxhall Chevette and was offered a new job. Classified telesales supervisor at the Midwest Times. Much more my sort of role. Back on solid ground, at last.
But I hadn’t a clue what happened to Stuart after he left. Was that it? If so, why had my angel shown me such visions of hell all those years ago? Or was that particular hell reserved for my father?
As the weeks passed and my departure grew imminent, I decided that Stuart’s ignominious career meltdown was probably vengeance enough. Maybe he would end up selling toothpaste to his friends. Assuming he had any.
A few days before I left, the new temporary manager, Ray, asked to see me. I liked him. He was everything Stuart wasn’t. Good fun, knowledgeable and hardworking. In other circumstances, I could have enjoyed working with him. One of his first acts had been to reinstate Georgia.
He pointed toward a large cardboard box in the corner of the office.
“That’s been sitting there since I came over. It’s full of Stuart’s personal stuff and he doesn’t seem inclined to come and get it. I can’t get an answer on his phone either. It was ringing, but now there’s a message saying the line’s been disconnected. Cut off, I suppose. He surely can’t have run out of money yet, so I’m wondering if he’s moved. Would you mind going over there? If he still lives there, you could just hand him the box and make a swift getaway.” He grinned.
I hesitated. I really didn’t want to see Stuart again, but I couldn’t deny my curiosity.
I almost drove past his house. The once neat borders overflowed with unmown grass and weeds. In just a few short weeks, nature had enjoyed free rein in the once immaculate garden.
I checked the house number, parked and made my way up the moss-encrusted gravel path, toting the heavy box. I set it down and rang the bell. It echoed but no one answered, so I rang again.
I had started to look for somewhere to leave his belongings when he eventually opened the front door.
Stuart looked a world away from the smart-suited highflyer I’d grown to hate. His hair hung lank and greasy over a grubby blue collar. Food stains spattered his shirt, and his trousers looked as if he had sat in a mud puddle. He was barefoot, with dirty feet and overgrown toenails. He seemed to have problems focusing his bloodshot eyes, and even at my distance, I could smell the alcohol.
“Carly? What do you want? Come to gloat?” The slurring snarl mingled with the acrid stench of body odor and stale whiskey fumes.
“I was asked to bring this.” I pointed to the box, lying at my feet. Right now, I was glad it provided a barrier between us.
“You’d better bring it in.” He opened the door wider.
Should I refuse? I had no desire to cross his threshold. Yet, for some unaccountable reason, I felt almost sorry for him. For maybe five seconds.
Then a voice took over in my head, You have to go in. You wanted this. Now is the time to see it through.
Stuart cowered, stumbled backward and tripped. He fell on his back and screamed in pain. “God no! Get her away from me. Get her away!” His filthy hands covered his eyes.
“You can see her?”
He nodded and whimpered like a small child.
Now I had no choice. I couldn’t leave him lying there. Helpless.
I tried to help him up, the awful stench of him making me retch. I very nearly brought up the contents of my stomach there and then. It would only have added to the already vomit-streaked floor.
He threw me off.
I stared in horror. From the corner of each eye, rivulets of blood trickled down his cheeks.
His face had turned white. “Get away from me! You brought her here. You.”
“Brought who, Stuart? Who do you see?”
He pointed at the door behind me and pushed back with his heels, trying to escape.
I turned. Framed in the doorway, stood my angel. I turned back to him. “You can see her?”
“Of course I fucking can! You brought her. The time before when you came here. It must have been. You brought her and left her here. She’s been here. Waiting. All this time, tormenting me. Now she’s ruined me. You’ve ruined me. You fucking freak!”
I stared at him, but could find no pity for this cowering wreck of a man.
“No, Stuart. You brought all of this on yourself. This is for what you did to me. Everything you did to me. And to everyone else you have wronged. She has come to make sure justice is done.”
“Justice? No, not her. Never her. Not that spawn of hell.”
For one instant, doubt crept in. I swept it away. The ramblings of a madman. That’s all it was. I felt nothing but contempt for him.
I looked back at my angel.
“Please finish it,” I said.
She raised her arm and my ears rang with his screams. The veins bulged in his arms, spreading tentacles of red and purple. The swelling spread like a time-lapse film of green shoots in spring. Skin peeled from his arms. His eyes became great pools of red as more blood vessels burst.
He screamed. Inhuman, animal sounds of agony and torment. His feet blackened and flayed. White bone gleamed under the peeling flesh.
The stench of charred flesh sickened me. I covered my nose and mouth, but I had to watch.
He could not die. She denied him that mercy.
My heart stayed hardened until his fleshless leg bones rattled. Only his face, with its bloody, running eyes, remained intact, so he could see and hear—and smell his own burned, rotten flesh.
“Enough now,” I said. “Please let him go.”
My angel opened her cloak. The screaming souls of the others greeted him and claimed him as their own. Then I realized what reached for him weren’t the same poor wretches that I’d seen crying out in agony before. These were their hellish predators, come to claim new prey. Jaws snapped and claws raked as they grabbed at the hysterical, half-dead wretch that had once been Stuart Campbell.
The now-forever-damned Stuart Campbell.
His cries drifted into the distance as my angel’s cloak settled over the scene of eternal carnage.
And so I was avenged the first time.
Chapter Ten
I started my new job a month later. New employer, new home and new town. Coombsford.
Already, just two weeks in, I enjoyed my new role. I had even started to make friends. I loved my flat overlooking the river and enjoyed the walk along the riverside to work. Twenty minutes there and back. Peaceful. I would watch the antics of the squabbling ducks and the majestic pair of swans gliding downstream.
It seemed a world away from the horror I’d witnessed at Stuart’s house that day. I had already put Baileyborough behind me.
I’d left his box of personal effects in the kitchen, taking care not to touch anything with my bare hands so that no fingerprints would be found. I even overcame my revulsion and cleaned his filthy floor, just in case any footprints emerge
d under close inspection, although I could see none. I bagged up the cleaning cloths so I could dump them later. I even washed the soles of my shoes, so none of his muck would spread out of the house. I was as thorough as any professional murderer.
Of course, there was no body. My angel had taken care of that. No body. No crime. He was just another missing person.
In due course, the police interviewed me and I told them, truthfully, when I’d last seen him. Of course, I didn’t tell them in what state I’d last seen him. They asked me if he seemed agitated in any way. I said he did. I told them about the whiskey fumes. I amazed myself at the cool way I conducted myself. They thanked me for my help and I heard no more.
I never knew who reported him missing. He didn’t seem to have much in the way of family. Just an ex-wife. Someone told me her name. Felicity. But everyone called her Fizz.
Some weeks later, I arrived at my parents’ home to find a tense atmosphere and a chill. All my childhood nightmares flooded back. I wanted to get back in my car and drive the two hundred miles back to Coombsford, but I’d promised Mum I’d stay for the weekend. She hadn’t seen me in months. So I gritted my teeth and hauled my suitcase out of the trunk.
My father barely acknowledged me. As for Mum, her red nose and swollen eyes told me she’d been crying.
“What’s going on?” I said as I set my suitcase on the floor.
Mum stood up and limped toward me. She winced at each step.
I put out my hand to steady her. “What’s happened?”
Mum opened her mouth to answer, but my father interrupted, “What the hell have you done to yourself? You look like something out of Auschwitz!”
“Never mind me. What’s happened here?”
“Your mother, the stupid, useless bint, didn’t renew the road tax and now I’ve got to pay a fine.”
The old, familiar anger coil tensed. “Why didn’t you deal with it? After all, you’re the one driving the car in the first place. They send the papers to you not her.”
Bang! My father’s chair toppled over.
“Now you’ve done it.” Mum hobbled out of the room.
“Did you do that to her?”
Dark Avenging Angel Page 9
