by Guy N Smith
Not so much as a grunt, just a vacant expression on the disfigured features. Williamson looked about him; there was nobody in sight. He heard footsteps on the pavement beyond the laurels and rhododendrons, hurrying past the drive entrance, not stopping. He was alone with this demented, diseased creature in human shape. That in itself was awful enough, but Mannion was beyond help and would surely be dead within the hour. With a start, the doctor realized that his duty was to the living, those who still might be saved – like Holly Mannion, doubtless blissfully unaware of her husband’s fate, alone in the cottage with that terrible, inexplicable force that still lived deep down in the old well shaft. He had to move fast.
Williamson straightened up, stretched out an arm, closed his eyes momentarily as his fingers made contact with Mannion’s arm, felt the heat of fevered flesh and grasped it gently but firmly. Mannion swayed, almost toppling.
‘Mannion.’ The doctor felt the need to talk even though he was probably neither heard nor understood, ‘I want you to come with me, old chap. You’re ill – probably the heat. I’m going to take you indoors and find you somewhere to lie down. You can rest there. Then I’ll be away for a while, and when I get back you’ll probably feel better. If not, then I’ll give you something to make you better.’ Liar, he accused himself.
He began to lead the sick man, a tottering step at a time, pulling him along, hoping that he wouldn’t fall, because he would never have been able to get him back on to his feet. He could not leave him where he was in case somebody came in through the gate. He would need to move Susan’s body, too; drag it into the bushes like a murderer trying to conceal the corpse of his victim, simply because he could not move the Range Rover until he did so. Then he would ring the police and let them sort things out whilst he rushed to Garth Cottage. Any questions that needed to be answered could be answered afterwards. Life came before the Festering Death.
The doctor glanced up at the windows of the house, fearing his wife might be looking out; he breathed an audible sigh of relief when he saw no face at the latticed panes. Spare her this, I pray you, God!
Into the reception area, now sliding Mannion along the polished linoleum floor as one might move a heavy filing cabinet to a new position. The first door was the waiting room, the second had a brass plaque which read ‘Treatment Room’ – a kind of minor operating theatre where the GP removed warts and stitched cuts which were not serious enough for the hospital in town. There was a lock, a means of preventing anybody from wandering in there by mistake. He opened the Treatment Room door.
With four whitewashed walls, a washbasin, a medicinal cupboard and a moveable padded treatment couch in the centre, it was basic but sufficient. Ideal, right now.
‘Now, let’s have you lying up on this.’ Williamson was sweating heavily and he felt suddenly weak. ‘Up we go old chap!’
One last supreme effort, and he pushed the limp figure on to the couch, then heaved it from the legs. The trolley moved, its well-oiled wheels taking it against the near wall, where it wedged. Williamson grunted as he swung the patient on to the upholstery and managed to catch him before he fell off the other side. ‘Bravo!’ He bent double, feeling sick, but it passed.
Mannion lay on his back and might have been staring up at the ceiling if his eyes had not been dead. The torso was heaving, the mucus bubbled in the nostrils. That stench was growing stronger now, Williamson noticed, its foulness emanating from the open abdominal wound as yellow and pink pus began to roll on to the pseudo-leather covering. The doctor turned his head away, hoping that it would all be over by the time he returned. Just a death certificate to write out. Cause of death … the Festering!
He stepped out into the hall, locked the door behind him, and as an afterthought pocketed the key. He could not take any chances. He felt his chest pounding and hoped that it was nothing serious. He wasn’t used to such exertions. He went outside and walked towards the parked vehicle. The girl was lying where he had left her, only her face was turned towards him – probably because he had moved her to examine her, he remembered. Her wide open blue eyes seemed to plead with him, and the parted lips looked as if they were struggling to speak. Which he knew was nonsense because she was dead.
He moved her gently back into the bushes and covered her with the spotless white overall that had fallen by her side – a shroud. It seemed a futile thing to do but he felt he owed it to her, a touch of dignity. The police would not approve; he should have known better and left her where she had fallen.
He made one last trip back to the house and used the telephone in reception. A quick call – there was no time to waste – but he had to inform the law at this stage, as the consequences might be serious if he did not.
He almost ran back to the Range Rover. He had wasted too much time already, and Holly Mannion’s life was at stake.
Holly had gone back indoors. There was nothing to stop out here for, she thought. Nick was dead, and they would never find him down there. Not that she cared if they did because it would be too late for all of them by then.
She had difficulty in walking and had to clutch at everything she bumped into to remain upright. Christ, she felt ill. Not so much the pain now, more a kind of numbness, like when she sat on the loo too long and her thighs lost their feeling. Instinctively she felt behind her, running her fingers through the spongy, slimy morass where her spine ended. There was a deep hole but she had not the courage to penetrate it with her hand, fearing it might go right into her bowels. It smelled as if it did.
She made for the stairs, not bothering to switch on the light. Her vision was impaired. She had been aware of that for some time and knew she was going blind. Darkness was a relief in a way.
She made her way slowly upstairs, crawling on all fours when she neared the top in case she fell back, slithering on to the polished bare boards of the landing. She went through to the bedroom; she needed to rest, to sleep. Perhaps when she awoke, she thought, everything would be all right and it had only been a bad dream.
She pulled herself upright and waited for her balance to return. Something shone silvery in the darkness, a vertical oblong that glinted evilly, watching her. The wardrobe mirror! It had a kind of hypnotic effect on her, commanded her attention, penetrated her confused thoughts.
She stared, but all she saw was an outline, a reflection of shadows, and could barely make out her own silhouette among them. That way she looked normal; it hid everything that she did not want to see. I don’t want to see any more, she thought. You have to. Put the light on!
No! But she knew she would, just like the victim of some terrible accident compelled to view their own injuries, fearing the worst but hoping for the best. She wouldn’t rest until she’d seen.
Reaching up for the light pull by the bed, hesitating with her fingers touching the cord, she hoped that perhaps it would not work because the bulb had blown or maybe there had been a power cut. She knew there was only one way to find out.
Blinding white light dazzled her even through her fogged vision. She clasped her hands over her eyes trying to shut it out, recoiling. She grabbed at the pull again, but it was swinging, avoiding her clutching fingers, to and fro, back and forth. Her arm was tiring and she was forced to lower it. She rested her back against the wall, and eventually opened her eyes.
The mirror shining at her had taken on the shape of a living, moving human being – a naked girl with firm breasts and wide hips, her body unblemished, trembling with fear and then with elation. Seeing what she wanted to see, scarcely recognizing herself, Holly remembered how she had looked the last time, and continued searching for those disfigurations – but did not find them. They were gone! Turning her back, twisting her head, she strained to view the place where it had all started, but there was nothing there. She was laughing and crying.
She sat down on the edge of the bed. She felt no pain, just a numbness; but she knew that was a small price to pay. Hysterical now, she lay back – and when she reached up again she found the lig
ht pull and plunged the room back into darkness.
Her mind flicked from one memory to another: Eaton, Fitzpatrick, Bennion … Nick Paton! Oh, God, how she hated him for what he had done, and herself for seducing him. And Mike, too – she was well rid of him. She hoped he was dead, wherever he was, because that way she had a clean slate, a fresh start. Tomorrow everything would be all right.
It was some time before she realized that there was no longer the silence of a balmy summer’s evening outside. A kind of swishing sound had started, like the wind getting up, soughing through the slurry-coated foliage. Or the rushing of water, she thought – perhaps the waste pipe in the adjacent field pumping again in an effort to rid the well of the filth that was alive in it. Continuous, escalating, rushing, the noise was growing in volume, frightening.
And then that familiar odour of putrefaction and evil came seeping in through the gaps in the badly fitted window.
19
Dusk came swiftly then turned to darkness with an alarming rapidity. It was always the same, summer or winter, in those small villages situated beneath the towering Bryn mountains. Once the sun had dipped behind the topmost peaks, the day surrendered to night.
Doctor Williamson was suddenly aware that it was dark. He had switched on the sidelights of the Range Rover as he pulled out of Canon Pine, but a mile further down the road he put on the headlights, their powerful twin beams reflecting the drought-ravaged countryside almost like an unexpected fall of snow. Eerie; he shuddered. It was like one of those dreams where he was trying to go somewhere but got nowhere, ending up exactly where he had begun. The drama at the surgery seemed to have lasted for hours; he had no idea how long it had taken.
The road was familiar, but now he saw it differently. This was no routine call, not even one of those emergencies which he got from time to time when somebody in one of the outlying homesteads had a heart attack or appendicitis. It was frightening; in a way he did not want to arrive at his destination and almost wished that he had waited for the police and accompanied them. But it was his duty to save lives, and every second he delayed could mean the difference between life and death.
Garth village. He found himself slowing subconsciously as he saw the 30 mph sign, then accelerated again. This was no time to be obeying the law to the letter. On through the village. There was nobody about. Lights were showing in the windows of houses and cottages, cars were parked in drives and in the main street. It was if the entire population was skulking indoors because they knew of the evil which had manifested itself.
The Mannions’ drive. He was turning in when his lights picked up the van blocking the way, forcing him to break sharply. That was the plumber’s vehicle – he knew it only too well. Momentarily relieved because he wasn’t alone and neither was Holly, he wondered if perhaps everything would be all right, after all.
He switched off the engine but left the headlights on, and sat for a moment, scrutinizing the scene below him. In the overgrown garden was a small hollow resembling a building site with its mounds of rubble and equipment. It was like a deep dark pool, which in fact it was. His mouth went dry at the thought of the long drop down through the earth to the foul water at the bottom, the very place where this ancient evil had spawned. Professor Shaw had not ridiculed the idea, and there could not possibly be any other explanation.
Doctor Williamson got out, leaving the door open and the lights burning to show him the way. He moved stiffly, slowly. There were no lights showing in the cottage; perhaps there was nobody at home – which would solve a lot of problems. But he knew it was not so. A kind of foreboding told him the evil was still here. He could smell it!
The stench of rotting corpses reminded him of an exhumed graveyard, the atmosphere heavy with disease. He remembered that awful day during his war years as an army MD when he had moved among the dead and wounded on the battlefield, the cries of anguish mingling with that unmistakable smell of death.
At first he thought it was his memory playing tricks on him, that low moan which filled the air, the wail that grew louder by the second – the agonized cry of a tortured soul, the ultimate in pain and despair. It vibrated the atmosphere, penetrated his brain and made him clutch his ears in an attempt to shut it out. He resisted the urge to flee back to his vehicle, to run from this place and leave the occupants to their fate. The sound resembled a rising wind and yet there was none, not so much as a gentle breeze. Coming at him, invisible demons attempted to drive him back. Begone! Fighting against this inexplicable force, he was groping his way towards that dreadful hole in the ground. Knowing that the heart of this terrible malevolence pumped at the bottom of that dark cold shaft.
A metre from the brink he halted, feeling the icy coldness, the penetrating damp of an opened grave. Labouring to breathe, he crawled now in case he fell. And then he heard the voice, the whisper that magnified and echoed down in those depths.
‘Help me!’
The wail, human and yet inhuman, was vaguely familiar. It was certainly not Holly Mannion. Who, then? Nick Paton, the plumber!
‘Paton … can you hear me?’ The doctor’s cry was little more than a whisper, whipped away by the force which tore at him. Knowing the plumber would not hear him, he tried again. ‘Paton, is that you?’
This time there was no reply, just a distant groaning. It had to be the plumber because his van was here. He had slipped and fallen down … there! Oh, merciful Lord, Paton was surely close to death. It would need ropes and potholing experts to bring the injured man to the surface. Williamson wondered how long the police would be. In the meantime where was Mrs Mannion? Was she down there, too?
‘Good evening, Doctor Williamson!’
He started, turned and saw that the porch light was on, illuminating the patio. Framed in the doorway was a figure that was no more than a silhouette against the glare of the overhead bulb, unrecognizable at this distance – but he knew it was Holly. He knew also that she was stark naked.
His initial embarrassment was swamped by a flood of fear. There was something decidedly odd about her: her posture, the way her neck craned forward as though she was … not just watching him but lusting for him, waiting because she knew that he would come to her.
He scrambled up, aware of his ungainliness, his clumsiness. He was breathing heavily and he could feel the way his temples pounded; there was a noise in his ears like rushing water, as if that strange sound which he had heard a few minutes ago was now concentrated inside his head. Instinctively he dusted himself down, then walked unsteadily towards Garth Cottage.
‘I’m glad you’ve come, Doctor.’ Her voice sounded almost normal. But not quite, ‘I had hoped that perhaps my husband had called to see you, but obviously he hasn’t, otherwise you would not be here now. You see, Mike is rather poorly – an ulcer on his stomach.’
Williamson stopped, then recoiled. Oh, God above, he could see Holly clearly now, a wretched crone who had aged decades these last few hours, her nakedness a mass of bulbous sores that spread and weeped, the pus seeming to carry the virus like molten lava, burning the flesh as it trickled thickly. Festering lips were drawn back in a wolfish snarl, and nostrils bubbled with liquid mucus. Eyes burned deep in their blackened sockets, and those wretched hands smoothed their way down her wasted stomach, meeting in the warmth of her pressed thighs. A caricature of femininity, there was no mistaking her provocativeness; she was a filthy slag offering her body for a pittance on a street corner.
‘Mrs Mannion —’
‘Holly, please … Gerald!’
He stiffened, stepped back and glanced up the drive. A pair of dazzling eyes blinded him temporarily; the Range Rover was like a hunting beast of the night which had spotted its prey and sought to hypnotize it, a stoat mesmerizing a hapless coney whilst it closed in for the kill, holding him there. He heard Holly’s stealthy padded footsteps and caught a whiff of her presence as though she had arisen from her foul bed in her stinking lair. He felt the clammy grip of her outstretched hand on his own.
‘Come inside, Gerald,’ she whispered, and began pulling him towards the door.
‘You’re ill.’ He was standing inside the kitchen now. ‘Very ill. I think we ought to call an ambulance.’
‘Oh, no.’ The stretching of those diseased lips was meant to be a reassuring smile. ‘I have been ill but I’m all right now. You see, it’s all Mike’s fault.’
‘Mike is …’
‘Dead?’
‘Seriously ill. Like yourself. He … killed a young girl!’
He had meant to shock her, using the only weapon he could muster, but it failed miserably. The sweat-soaked skin on her brow tried to furrow as she smiled again, ‘I’m not surprised. You see, his passion for city whores brought this upon us all. It will destroy us. I’m glad that he’s suffering, too.’
‘What … whatever to you mean?’
‘Let me tell you.’ She led him across to a chair and pushed him down on to it. ‘Mike went away. To London. When he returned and I saw that ulcer on his belly, I knew full well where he had got it. From lying with dirty whores! He came back, pretending that everything was all right, and in the meantime infected me. And others. The plague is spreading fast. The plumber caught it. I did the only possible thing in the circumstances: I buried him deep – very deep. But the grave … the well shaft, must be filled in before it is too late. I would have buried Mike, too, but he must have guessed and fled. Wherever he is, I beg of you to bring him back here so that we can inter him. But perhaps we are too late and the disease is already raging through the community.’
Williamson’s sweat had chilled and he shivered uncontrollably. He was hearing yet another version of the legend which old Josh Owen had related to him, the one passed down from father to son over several generations. A modern-day version of the return of the prodigal son, the plague that could not die except by fire. The Festering Death was risen from its burial place!
