“You know it because of your dreams?”
“They’re not dreams anymore. I’m having them in waking moments as well.”
He nodded and unsteepled his fingers, reaching his left hand across the desk to pick up a pen. It was a terribly expensive gold fountain pen. The quill scribbled quickly on a small rectangular notepad, and even looking at it upside down and with his handwriting, she thought she could recognise her name.
“Tell me, Miss Whitstable, where are you from?”
“I grew up largely in Fallowford, but I moved around other places in Kent as well. It depended on” – again there was that long suffering smile – “where there was a bed available for me.”
The pen wrote down the name of her home town.
“Do you still live in Kent?”
“No, I live in Worcester Park now.”
“Oh.” He nodded with his eyes. “So not far away then? And you have only recently started dreaming – or thinking – about The Butterfly Clinic?”
Her “Yes” came out as a whisper. Making him glance up at her to confirm her answer.
A pondering expression came over his face as he sat the pen down at a diagonal across the notepad. Doctor Penhaligan rested back in his leather chair.
“I’m sure you realise,” he said finally, “that it’s basic psychology that witnessing a traumatic event will have an effect on one’s psyche. Even if you don’t want it to, even if you try to suppress it – especially if you try to suppress it. These dreams you are suffering could be the awakening of long forgotten memories, or they could be hallucinations. After all, your current place of residence isn’t far from this clinic. You may have seen one of our brochures and – in your current fragile state – latched onto it.”
Her voice came out without a quaver of doubt. “I am not hallucinating. I know these memories are real, I know they are! I’ve never seen a brochure, I promise you.”
Doctor Penhaligan sniffed once. “So let me ask you a few questions. When you think of this house, what thoughts go through your mind?”
Her hands gripped tight, Alice made sure to choose her words carefully. “When I think of it, it seems to always be surrounded by fog. So maybe I was here in winter time, or autumn. The building itself is large and it’s terrifying to a young girl, and I think” – she hesitated – “well, I imagine it’s like a ghost house. It’s big and its echoing and you have all these grounds around it. Most of it I’ve never been to or will never see, but every part of it seems to contain a threat.”
Still he sat back in his seat. She’d thought her reminiscences would make him pick up the pen and start scribbling again, but he resisted the urge.
“You mentioned you didn’t have parents, Miss Whitstable. Are you in these dreams – these memories – the archetypal lost little girl seeking out her mother?”
She bridled a little at his tone, but tried not to show it. “No, not my mother. There’s a little boy though, it’s him I’m looking for. But when I find him” – she kept her tone steady with an effort – “he’s dead.”
The doctor’s eyes actually widened. “A little boy?”
“Yes.”
“And you know who this little boy is?”
“His name is Paul. Or was Paul, I suppose.” The confidence in her voice seemed to falter. “But I don’t actually know his surname or anything else about him. I do know he was in this house with me and I think he found himself in trouble and I think he might have died here. That’s what I keep dreaming – that he died here.”
A few seconds ticked past, the clock in the next room echoing.
“Interesting. I can assure you, Miss Whitstable, that I really have no idea what you’re talking about and really don’t see how a boy could have died on the grounds without us being very aware of the fact. Nevertheless, your story intrigues me. You seem to be convinced that what you’re saying is true. I don’t know how much actual truth there actually is to it, but let’s see if we can at least throw a little light on to what on earth is going on in that head of yours.” He picked up the brown phone on his desk and spoke into it politely. “Yes, can you tell me whether we have any paperwork for an Alice Whitstable? She may have been a patient here –” He paused, covered the mouthpiece with a hand and addressed Alice: “How long ago would you estimate it was.”
She tried not to shrug and appear negative. “I can’t really remember, but if I had to guess, I’d say about fifteen years ago.”
“Fifteen years ago,” he told the person on the line. “If you can’t find anything there, scour the files anywhere between – say – twelve and eighteen. We want to do all we can. Thank you.”
Doctor Penhaligan put the receiver down and smiled at her reassuringly. Except her wariness was back and she didn’t feel in anyway reassured.
Chapter Nine
“I’m sure they will only be a few minutes,” he told her.
His slightly crooked grin, rising up from under his hawk-like nose didn’t have quite the soothing effect he probably wanted. If anything, it made him look like an old schoolmaster taking too much pleasure from giving a test. Or a detention. Or the cane.
“So…” He drew the word out long and ponderous. “Can you remember any specific details from the time you say you spent here, Miss Whitstable?”
She shook her head, ruefully.
“The names of any doctors?”
“No.”
“How about the nurses? Do you remember any taking a maternal interest in you?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“No little piece of corroborative detail that would add a touch of verisimilitude to the story you have told?”
She swallowed, certain he was now making fun of her. “No, I just recall being here.”
“Yes, in your dreams. And in these dreams it is as if both The Butterfly Clinic and this little boy are calling out to you?”
She nodded. Her hands stayed tight in her lap and her eyes squinted with determination, letting him know that he wasn’t going to make her doubt herself.
“And if your memories are correct, then this little boy is calling to you from beyond the veil?”
“I know what I can remember.”
He nodded, that smile getting wider across his face. “Of course you do, of course you do. Tell me, Miss Whitstable, how does it feel to be back here?”
“Feel?”
“Well, from what you say, this house had loomed ominously large in your psyche in recent times. Was there a frisson when you walked in through the door? Is there something in here now calling out to you? Anything that seems familiar enough to evoke an emotional response, make you gasp?”
Alice tried not to show any confusion. “No, I don’t think so.”
“Interesting. So this house has intruded into your dreams and your thoughts all the way over there in the London suburbs, but while you’re here, nothing?”
Straightening her shoulders, she swallowed, her throat quite dry. “I can’t explain it, doctor. I don’t really know what’s going on, but I know that I was here and that something happened to me when I was. That’s all I can tell you.”
He sat a little further back in his chair and then rocked himself forward again. “Well, with a bit of luck your file – if there is one – will throw light on the matter.”
The two of them stared at each other. Doctor Penhaligan still smiling; Alice no longer open to being charmed by his smile.
“Do you know,” he said. “I suddenly realise that I am an abominable host. Here you are, a guest in my office, and I haven’t once asked you if you’d like a beverage of some kind. A tea or a coffee? Would you like refreshment, Miss Whitstable?”
“A water, please.”
“Only water? You wouldn’t prefer something more substantial? It is after noon.”
Her throat was really parched. “Just a water.”
“Fair enough.” He stood up, long and angular the other side of the desk. His tailored suit seemingly accentuating every angle, rathe
r than smoothing them out. “As my assistant is delving into whatever paperwork we might have on you, I’ll get it myself.”
All his movements were performed with the most practised grace, as if in another life he’d been the most delicate of dancers. He spun around from behind the desk and was at the door in a couple of spry steps.
But at the door, his hand on the handle, Doctor Penhaligan stood back and regarded her thoughtfully.
“Are you sure you don’t feel anything, Alice?” It was the first time he had called her by anything other than her surname. “Are you sure there’s nothing here apart from you, me and this office?”
Still in her chair, she stared at him blankly. Feeling as uncomfortable as she’d ever felt in her life and not quite understanding the reason for it. There was something about him that was wrong; an indefinable intent which suddenly made her skin clammy and her stomach roil. She regarded him with her most level gaze, not trusting herself to open her mouth. Eventually she shook her head.
“Interesting,” he said, possibly more to himself than her. Then that crooked smile came back. “Water it is. Please excuse me a moment.”
He exited the door and she took a deep breath, happy to be alone and hoping that they weren’t going to try and fob her off with an excuse. Try to get rid of her with fake politeness. Slowly she turned her head towards the window, thankful to have a moment’s peace.
It was only a moment however.
The door to his office had been open the entire time they’d been chatting. But on his way out, Doctor Penhaligan had shut it behind him.
Suddenly there was the thud of electronic bolts sliding forcefully across. More than one. They were obviously heavy and solid, bursting from the walls and fixing the door in place. It was the sound of her being trapped.
With a yelp, Alice leapt up and dashed to the door. Yanking at the handle, trying to pull it, even though she knew it would be futile.
It was then she heard the metallic grinding and whirring behind her.
Somehow she knew what was happening before she turned to look, before her conscious mind registered it.
Two big metal shutters were moving on rollers out from the walls and across that big wide window. Blocking off the outside world and locking her in completely and absolutely.
It was just as they met in the middle, kissed with a thump, that all the lights in the room went out.
She staggered backwards, stuck in the no-man’s land between the desk and the door, Alice let out a shriek. She’d known not to charge towards the windows, how futile (and painful) it would be to force herself between the closing metal. But now she was alone and trapped in the dark, and there was nothing she could do but scream.
For a minute at least, that’s all she did. Cry with fear from the bottom of her lungs, knowing all the time that it was Doctor Penhaligan who had done this to her. And that there would no one else in earshot who would care what was happening.
She stopped screaming, it did no good.
Even though she held herself still, her body shuddered with suppressed panic. This was a spacious coffin, they could keep her here for hours undisturbed. Geoff was outside in the car, but even if this meeting had gone normally, neither of them had had a clue how long it might take.
How long would it be until Geoff became concerned? Too long. Doctor Penhaligan could rape her, kill her, do all kinds of experiments on her. There was nothing she could do about it.
No, she could fight, couldn’t she?
The sound of her screams echoed around her skull even after she had ceased and started to get control of herself.
Strangely it was the realisation of how caged in she was which calmed her. Yes, Geoff would come and ask where she was eventually, but a lot could happen before then. And even when he did worry, what would he do if those inside the building claimed that they had never seen her? Never even heard of her. An eminent doctor was going to receive a lot more respect from authority than some long-hair from a record shop. It could be hours before she was found, but equally it could be days.
And that thought was the one which stopped her going into hysterics. All she had now was herself and so she had to look after herself, no matter how terrified she felt.
The screaming fading slowly from her mind, she carefully turned around on the spot. Her heels stuck together the whole way, her toes doing the work. The darkness around her was all consuming, pitch-black. She had known roughly where she’d been when the lights went out, and now she held out her hands and tried to get her bearings. Working out just how far away she was now from the door, ready to spring towards it should it open again.
“Hello!” her voice was hoarse. “Doctor Penhaligan? Are you there?”
There was silence, not even the ticking of that clock anymore. Alice was trapped in pure blackness and pure quiet. So perfect was the nothingness that, left there too long, she might start to suspect she didn’t exist.
Her voice this time had more than a hint of desperation to it. “Hello?” she yelled again.
Suddenly lights switched on.
There was one blinding white light shining from behind the desk, which, until she raised her hand and took a step to the left, hit her full in the eyes. Behind it there was a bright green light, accompanied by a harsh red. She staggered back from them all and when she stared down felt a bit sick, the way the lights merged together seemed to make the entire room, even her clothes and her skin, spiral.
“Doctor Penhaligan?”
This time he deigned to answer her, purring over a crackly loud speaker.
“So, Alice, do you by chance remember me now?”
Chapter Ten
“I have known you your whole life, Alice,” his voice took great delight in telling her. “And I say that without hyperbole or exaggeration. You see, I delivered you. I was actually the one who welcomed you into this world. The first person to properly see you. Before your mother, before either of the nurses, before any of the other interested parties. It was me. I’m not your father, Alice, but no one has ever been closer to a father for you than I. No man has ever cared more about you than I.”
His voice sighed long and deep through the speakers. “Your mother was an incredibly special person. I think – actually I know, as we discussed it more than once – that she saw herself as cursed, but really she was special. There were few people ever born who were as special as her, who could have been such a boon for this country. And you being her daughter made you special too! The events of the last week have proved that. Once upon a time, nay-sayers with ledgers and limited imaginations took you away from me. But I knew that I was right about you and, if I waited, you would find your way back to me. And so it has proved. You have no idea how happy I am, Alice, you really don’t.”
It required tremendous effort to stop herself screaming again; shivers ran the full length of her body.
“You are special, Alice. Truly you are, I’m positive now that you are even more special than your beloved mother.” Maybe she was imagining it, the sound was echoing and booming through those speakers and so its quality wasn’t great, but it seemed like he might be on the verge of weeping. “You were always destined to be special, Alice. Because of who your mother was, because of who your father most likely was – you were born special too. So I had to be there the day you were delivered, I had to see you in your first moments in this world. So I could imprint on you. So I could let you know that I would always be there for you.”
The blinding coloured lights, and the way his voice bounced around the wood panelling of the walls, was making her dizzy. She felt sick with disorientation. Her hand reached out to the corner of the desk, leaning her full weight down. Desperately she tried not to focus on the voice, to not get lost in whatever the hell he was saying. But she was a literal captive audience.
Through squinting eyes – as if that could ward off the oncoming headache – she stared around and tried to spot some kind of way out. A gap in this cage, a chink of hope for her. No
thing was obvious, and she nearly yelled in frustration. The room was solid, it looked impenetrable. Those lights were stationary, but when she stared at them together it was like they were spinning around. His voice thudded into her skull.
“There is no way out until I say there is a way out, Alice.” He chuckled, proud of himself for reading her thoughts. “You were torn away from me once and, now that you’ve come back of your own free will, I can’t afford to have you just wander off again. You and I need to speak, you have to listen to what I have to say.”
She stared up, as if an eager audience for his speech – like she was that bloody HMV dog – but her gaze flitted around every corner. Seeking something. Anything.
“Do you really not remember me, Alice? Even now, after you’ve walked through the doors of this great old house again? In a way that is hurtful. When you were young, you and I spent an awful lot of time together. When you were brought back to me that first time – after your mother had absconded with you – we sat and talked together in my office. That office right there, Alice. We actually played together on the floor in front of the desk. You wanted me to marry your favourite dolly. Judy, her name was. Do you remember that? You received your Christmas presents from me, and that year I even dressed up as Father Christmas. But you saw through my disguise. Saw through it immediately.” He was so amused. “You said that I was too thin to be the real Father Christmas and that I had to stop messing around lest the real Father Christmas become annoyed. Do you remember that? Do you? The files we’ve kept on you here are actually voluminous. I have tapes of us talking, if you’d like to listen to them. Black and white film of us playing together, if you’d like to see them.”
Vomit rose suddenly to her throat, and she just about swallowed it back down. Not knowing what else she could do, she jumped forward and threw herself against the door again. Knowing it was futile, but hoping it would present a little give. That there’d be something she could cling onto.
Certain Danger Page 5
