by Paul Magrs
More screams as she crosses the road. A taxi swerves. Jessie roars again and the sound is an ancient, primeval one, echoing across the bleak bay.
Then she’s gone. She’s nipped down the steps, back on to the beach. We cross the road after her and peer down over the edge and she’s been swallowed up by the shadows. Just in time. There are sirens. Police, an ambulance, arriving in the minutes following her departure. I hope she hasn’t hurt anyone. They’ll get her if she has. Even as it is, I think Jessie’s days must be numbered. People know she’s here now. They know she’s a pest.
‘That was amazing!’ Cleavis can’t quite catch his breath. ‘I’ve seen nothing of the sort before! Not in this country, at any rate. You say she’s called Jessie?’
I nod grimly, looking out over the bay. ‘She used to be my friend.’ And I hope she makes it back, across the wet sand, to the sanctuary of her cave.
It takes me some time to get over the shock of seeing Jessie there, and everyone’s reactions to her. And even I was looking from the outside, frozen on the pavement, clutching my handbag, all dressed up, thinking she was monstrous. Me! This time, it was me, Brenda, thinking that somebody else was the monstrous one. Novel for me. Though I had neither the time nor the inclination to gloat about it.
How could I gloat? I was watching the normal human beings – the holiday folk – running away and shrinking from Jessie’s touch. They fell back in horror at her approach. She has mutated so far into something from their prehistory: they seem to have an atavistic dread of the woman, with her matted fur, distended swaying breasts and long, yellow fangs. She is unforgivably far removed from what they regard as human. And so they will want her taken away. They will want her destroyed.
Henry and I talk about this in anguished whispers as we walk back through the town. We can hear the news passing from mouth to mouth amongst the night-time crowd: the truth becoming elastic, exaggerated, as it spreads into the consciousness of the place. There’s a monster on the loose. A female monster.
Even as Henry and I discuss the matter, I am thinking private thoughts I would never say aloud. I am thinking that I can suddenly appreciate how I might be seen by the normal folk. Looking at Jessie from the outside, I am suddenly aware of what it is like to gaze upon a monster.
And what if my disguise ever fell away? What if people saw through all the fragile bits of my human alias? Some night when I thought I was blending in, and mixing with the everyday mass of people . . . what if all the wigs and the outfits and the skilfully applied make-ups simply dropped off? What if they could see through my feeble attempts to remain inconspicuous? And they saw me as a freak. A beast. A creature to be hounded out of town.
Well. It’s happened before, hasn’t it?
It’s very easy to turn back into the monster. I just have to stop making the effort. I could revert, easy as anything.
And then I’d have to move on again. I’d have to leave this latest home behind. I’ve done it so many times before. But not here. This time I’m staying. I can’t let those shrieks of horror get under my skin and discombobulate me. I have to hang on to myself. My heart goes out to Jessie, though, and I hope there’s something we can do to help her.
Does Henry Cleavis expect to be asked up for coffee? It doesn’t even cross my mind. I plant a swift peck on one of his shiny red cheeks and push him firmly off in the direction of the Miramar.
My head’s splitting now, from thinking about monsters.
Funny thing happens, Tuesday morning. I’m actually feeling quite cheery and ready to face whatever the world can throw at me. I’ve had a decent night’s rest again. I’m managing to catch up with the sleep my ghosts have robbed me of. But I wake to the sound of somebody else moaning and wailing and full of upset. It’s next door. I can hear a woman crying and a man’s voice, trying to calm her down. With a shock I realise it’s Leena. I realise that, in all the time they’ve lived next door, I’ve never heard their voices coming through the rough plaster walls. They are the quietest neighbours in the world.
Of course, I have to find out what the palaver’s about. I have a quick breakfast and make my way to the shop at the front. They haven’t opened up. The place looks so strange without the boxes and boxes of dew-covered fruit and vegetables ranked outside. Their lack makes me think something absolutely awful has happened. I knock on the front door. No answer. I bang hard on the front door. I start to get impatient and keep on banging till I get a result. These are my neighbours! I need to know what’s going on!
When he opens the door just a crack to speak to me, Raf looks drawn and pale with worry. He explains that they are taking a day off, and I’ll have to walk to the new supermarket for my supplies this morning.
‘That doesn’t matter.’ I shrug. ‘I’m more worried about all the crying I could hear through my walls . . .’
Raf gulps. ‘I’m sorry about this. If we disturbed you . . .’
‘What’s the matter with Leena? What’s happened?’
He darts a backward glance. She’s calling for him from upstairs, sounding like an invalid. ‘Look, I shall have to go, Brenda. Leena’s needing me.’
‘But what is it? Maybe I can help. What’s happened? Do tell me, Rafiq.’
He frowns heavily. Such a good-looking boy, even when he’s distraught like this and peering through a tiny gap in the door. ‘She got a letter this morning. She doesn’t know where it comes from. She started crying as soon as she read it, at breakfast. I’ve never seen her like this before.’
I nod grimly. ‘She isn’t the only one.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Where is this letter?’
‘She put it straight down the sink. The whatsit, the waste disposal. I never got a look in. I don’t even know what it said. She’s been hysterical ever since. Look, Brenda . . .’ Leena’s pathetic voice is more persistent now, wafting through the shop.
‘Will you let me in to speak to her?’
‘Not yet,’ he says, looking panicked. ‘She’s in no fit state. I’ve never seen her like this before. Come later, maybe, huh?’
He just about slams the shop door in my face as he darts off to see to his wife.
Well. I wonder what was said in Leena’s letter. Something awful, to make her react like that. I turn away, musing. Why didn’t she keep the evidence? Was what the letter said really that bad? Was she really that ashamed of its contents?
Seems to me that whatever the letters are saying, it must be true.
Of course, I have to tell Effie about this latest development.
I have to suffer her awful tea in her messy living room.
It’s rare that Effie actually lets anyone into her home and, when you’re there, you can see why. Fastidious as she is, the old thing isn’t very house-proud. There’s dust an inch thick everywhere. The pictures and mirrors are opaque with it. When I ease myself down on the old horsehair sofa, I imagine I can feel the dust mites jangling about inside the old fibres.
Effie’s brewing up some of her tarry black tea and listening with pursed lips as I tell her about Leena and her reaction to her letter.
‘Hmm,’ she goes. ‘I’ve always thought that girl’s got something to hide.’ This morning, Effie doesn’t look at all sympathetic. She tutted and rolled her eyes when I told her about the waste disposal. ‘Whoever is sending these things knows just the right thing to say. In order to make the maximum impact. Quite a skill, really.’ She hands me my tea.
‘Something else,’ I say. ‘I thought we’d seen the last of these letters.’
Effie knows what I mean straight away. ‘You mean, because of Rosie’s death? Murder, suicide, whichever it was.’ She passes me a plate of rather grey-looking biscuits. ‘You thought that was the end of it?’
‘She was one of our best suspects . . .’
‘Perhaps.’ Effie crunches into a custard cream. ‘Unless . . . the letters went second class . . .?’
‘Hand-delivered, remember? At least, Sheila’s was. No stamp. We
’ll have to check with Leena later about hers.’
‘Hand-delivered, hmm.’ Effie frowns. ‘Someone very local. Very handy. Making mischief. Deadly mischief.’
I realise, watching her, that she’s quite enjoying this whole business.
My phone’s ringing when I get back home. Sharp, insistent, clamouring for my attention: I get the feeling it’s been ringing for some time. I pound my way up the stairs and burst into my attic. It’s Robert.
‘We’ve missed you, up at the Miramar. Haven’t seen you in a few days.’ He’s on early shift at the front desk again, running up Sheila’s phone bill.
‘Sheila clammed up on us, Robert.’ I sigh. ‘Said there was nothing else she could tell us to help our investigation.’ And then, lowering my voice slightly, I let him know what happened next door this morning.
‘So it couldn’t have been poor Rosie writing these things . . .’
I sigh. ‘That’s what Effie and I have just worked out. I feel bad for suspecting her now.’
‘There’s something else,’ Robert bursts out. ‘Someone else got one of those letters this morning.’
‘Who? Not you, Robert?’ My heart leaps up at this in dismay. I realise that I’d go ballistic should anyone see fit to threaten him.
‘No, no. Guess who, though? Mrs Claus! She woke up this morning to one of these insinuating missives. And she just about exploded with wrath! She’d been dreading getting one of these things and went into meltdown as soon as she saw it on her breakfast tray this morning. Apparently she’s had a right bad turn!’
I frown. ‘But how do you know this?’
‘Martin the elf. Remember him? Friend of mine from the Christmas Hotel.’
‘Oh yes.’ Indeed, I remember him better for having seen him last night, when I was there myself. I didn’t like the look of him. I never have. Sneaky-looking sort.
I’m distracted for a second then, realising that I’ve had tea and mouldy biscuits with Effie and she never once asked me about my date last night. Jealous old thing. And, as a consequence, I never thought to tell her about seeing Jessie on her rampage through the Silver Slipper. Well, perhaps it’s just as well not to confirm Effie’s prejudices. Now I’m thinking: do I tell Robert? Will he want to know that his aunt is running about the town, monstrous and in the nuddy?
Best keep it for a while, that news.
Right now he’s telling me something else, in that endearing, urgent way he has.
Midnight tonight, is what he’s saying. Out on the west pier. Can you make it, you two? He’s saying it’s the only time he can get safely out of the hotel. When he can get away without anyone noticing. Well, I know that’s true, the way things are at the Christmas Hotel . . .
‘Sorry, lovey,’ I interrupt. ‘I’ve lost your gist there. What are you on about midnight for? What’s that about the pier?’
Robert is very patient with me. He repeats: ‘Martin says there’s more news. Something else. And he wants to tell you and Effie. Tonight. On the pier. He’s got some info for you two in particular.’
‘Us two . . .?’
‘And midnight is the only time he can get out from under the control of Mrs Claus.’
I nod slowly. ‘We’ll be there,’ I tell him.
‘Gotta go. Here comes Sheila!’ And his phone slams down.
It’s a remarkably clear night tonight. There’s no cloud cover at midnight and the day’s heat has departed. Luckily, Effie and I had an inkling of this and we’ve wrapped up warm for our jaunt on to the west pier. The moonlight is stark: drenching us in blue. Our footsteps sound very loud on the old, worn stone.
‘Are you happy then, Brenda?’ Effie asks.
I glance at her. ‘With what?’
‘You know.’ She smirks. She sounds a bit schoolgirlish and coy. ‘With your feller.’
‘He’s not my feller.’ I look around then, knowing that he’s up there, on the prom somewhere. He’s watching us from one of the memorial benches, through an ancient pair of binoculars. When I told him about his meeting he wasn’t at all pleased. He insisted on spying on us from the shore. The shore’s a long way back, though, from the end of the pier. I’m not sure what kind of help he could be, if anything kicked off. But I like the fact that he still wants to be there. On the alert.
‘You look happy,’ Effie observes.
Well. I haven’t even really thought about it. I suppose that means I must be happy.
Henry Cleavis is behind it all, of course, and shrewd Effie realises this. At least she is being a bit more gracious and she has stopped openly criticising him. Meeting him on the prom tonight – Henry gallantly clutching his binoculars – she allowed herself to be formally introduced to him. She has started to act as if she is glad for me. I know she’s impressed by his smartness, his classiness. And, as we stroll nervously down the curving pier, she is showing a genuine, open interest in him.
‘An academic, eh? An expert on the Icelandic sagas, you said? And he’s retired, is he? And where was he a don, hm? Oh, very nice, Brenda. Very nice indeed. He sounds like a fascinating person.’
She’s making a proper effort, is Effie. And I’m glad about that, as well.
It’s a long time since I felt anything like this.
It’s funny, to wake up in the mornings and to know that most of the things I’ll do today will be just ordinary, mundane things. The humdrum things I always do. Buying sausages and tea leaves. Making up beds. Scouring out bath tubs and polishing brasses. But I also know – in the instant that I spring awake – that I’ll see him today as well. I know that chances are we’ll spend some portion of the day together. We’re in those early days of (say it!) a romance, when time concertinas up. The gaps between sightings are short but, subjectively, very far apart. We’ll make time to meet, or we will just happen into each other, easy as you like. This town is small enough for some benign, gentle force to guide us into each other’s orbit. I will see him today, and tomorrow, and the next day. I feel that he is part of my life now. I have never felt so pleased and . . . buoyed up.
Effie is peering off into the dark realms of the sea, leaning over the railings. She scans the flats of the sands, all the way across to the eastern pier, which bends to almost touch the end of this one, like a gigantic pair of calipers. The harbour is the safe space between the piers: the town’s huge maw. Effie can’t see anything yet. Neither can I, even with my heightened senses.
I haven’t opened my heart to Henry Cleavis. I haven’t told him anything yet. I tell him I’m pleased to see him when I do, but that’s as far as confession goes. I don’t want to go making a fool of myself. It could be fatal, to start slobbering over him and getting over-emotional. But tread easily, Brenda. Don’t come on too strong. (But, really! What a thought! I feel ridiculous for even writing it down.) I shouldn’t go on daft, getting my hopes up. I can’t go acting like a girl.
I never was a girl, was I? I was always as I am.
I don’t think Henry will ever really feel anything for me. He’s a timid, bookish bachelor. He’s over a century old! There’s no place in his life for a woman like me.
There’s no way he would ever feel like this – this wonderful! – about me.
I’d best keep it all under my woolly hat.
‘Ah,’ says Effie, jolting me out of my reverie. I blink.
‘What is it?’
She’s facing back down the long stretch of pier we’ve covered. She’s looking back down that avenue of wrought iron lamps. There’s a man coming towards us. He’s hurrying along: a tubby, unathletic figure, making for the end of the pier. Furtive, keeping his head down.
‘That’s him,’ Effie says. ‘This Martin person.’
And as he nears us at last, we see he’s in the Christmas Hotel’s regulation red and green figure-hugging elf suit.
‘That doesn’t do anything for him,’ Effie says.
I shush her as the young man approaches. His face is twisted with exertion and near-panic. There’s something about the look o
f him that disturbs me. And suddenly I know that Effie and I will have to tread very cautiously with this one.
‘I know you are big pals with Robert,’ he says. He stares right into my face. There’s something in his eyes that I don’t like at all, but I return his stare bravely. What can he do to me? There’s two of us here. There’s Cleavis ready to come running. But still something about this young man unnerves me. ‘If Robert trusts you, I can trust you,’ he says. His breath is shuddering out of him. He keeps darting looks back at the bright facades of the hotels.
‘Look here,’ Effie says. ‘What is all this about? What makes it so imperative that you drag the two of us out here . . .’ I can hear St Mary’s bonging out midnight over the harbour and a chill sweeps through me.
‘I needed to get away from her influence . . . right away . . .’
Effie raises an eyebrow. ‘ “Her”?’
‘I don’t know how much Robert has told you,’ Martin goes on. ‘About the way Mrs Claus . . . has everyone under her thumb . . .’
‘Drugs in the cocoa,’ I blurt. ‘That’s how Robert reckons it’s done. Mind-altering whatsits.’
He looks surprised. ‘You know, then. You know how she gets everyone doing her bidding.’ He looks on the point of tears. ‘Terrible things, sometimes.’
‘Calm yourself down,’ Effie says. I’m amazed to see her patting and rubbing the elf ’s back. Not like her at all. But this boy seems as if he’s about to have a nervous breakdown on us.
‘She was so scared, you see. She was convinced that . . . Well, she’s got a lot to hide, see? And she thought it was the only thing to do . . . Of course, she never does her dirty work herself, does she?’
‘Hang on,’ I say. ‘You’re rambling. Slow down. Deep breaths.’
‘I take it by “she”, you mean Mrs Claus?’ Effie asks, darting me a quick glance. I swallow hard. It looks as if we are about to be drawn once more into the malign world of Mrs Claus’s eternal Christmas.
