by Paul Magrs
I can’t help thinking she’s talking too soon. What if her conditioning takes her over on the last night of August? What if she can’t help herself handing me over to those ghostly women writers?
Three days have gone by since our evening in my attic when I read aloud the letter from Robert. Three whole days have gone by, and there’s no sign of any of them.
‘It was a bit of a long shot anyway,’ Panda grumbles. ‘And who’s to say any of it was real? That young chap might have just made all that business about the Faerie people up out of his head!’
‘I don’t think so, Panda,’ I frown. He’s hanging half out of my shopping bag as we go round the supermarket. I wonder what’s happening at the Miramar without Robert at the helm? Can his staff look after it all alone? Perhaps he closed it down before he went off on his mission. I feel too preoccupied by my own cares to go and check on the place.
I amble along Silver Street, chatting occasionally to Panda, peering in antique shops as we go by. We lose ourselves staring at vintage clothing and theatrical jewellery and displays of kitsch household wares. Soon we’re looking at a window display of books about angels and fairies in the window of The Spooky Finger.
The shop is open. Suddenly, against my better judgement, I decide I’m going in there.
‘Is this Mr Danby’s shop?’ Panda asks, suddenly alert.
I nod grimly and fling open the door rather noisily.
‘Danby…!’ I call, stepping into the shop and its labyrinth of tall bookcases. The loathing in my own voice disturbs me. But I won’t stop now. ‘Are you there?’
I can hear scuffling of papers and the shuffling of his patent leather shoes on the floorboards. He’s alone at his cash desk back there.
‘Danby..?’ I call again, and I can hear a stifled sob of fright. The sound pleases me and I press on past gardening and cookery, knowing that the little rat is within my grasp.
There he is. In the dimly-lit furthest corner of his shop. He’s cowering at his desk, his comb-over flapping about. He holds up his hands. ‘I don’t want you in here! You can’t come in here! I defy you!’
I stand right in front of him, glowering down. ‘Danby.’
He’s gone green as absinthe. ‘I’d heard that you’d come back to life. I’d heard that the witch had used her unholy powers to raise you from the dead…’
I lean closer over him. I put my face level with his until I catch a whiff of his rotten gums. ‘And who put me among the dead in the first place then, eh?’
‘G-go away! Leave me alone! It was just a trick… a trick that went wrong!’
‘I should punch your lights out,’ I tell him, quite calmly. ‘I should rip off your doings and wear them as earrings. For all the trouble you’ve caused me and my friends during these past few years.’
‘P-please…’
Now I’ve got him frightened just enough. I can let up a little and make him do what I want. ‘But as it happens, I am here as a customer.’
‘W-what?’
‘I’m looking for a book. An edition of a specific publication, actually. A journal called ‘Tendencies.’ Do you know it?’
It seems like he does. He nods shakily. ‘We have a few. It’s a scholarly journal about the literature of the Grotesque and the Sensational.’
‘It sounds right up my street,’ I say, still using my most menacing voice. ‘I believe that my young friend Robert published an essay or a story in one particular issue.’
‘Did he?’ asks Danby, sounding innocent.
‘Find it for me,’ I tell him.
I watch him as he scoots about, hunting through the periodicals and journals shelves. He tosses aside arcane pamphlets on mountaineering, exorcism, metal detecting and needlepoint. And at last he comes up with a slim volume with a dull purple cover.
‘Tendencies Volume Twelve Issue Six,’ he says. ‘It’s in here, I believe. Would you like a bag for it?’
I snatch the thing out of his skinny fingers. ‘No, and I’m not paying you for it, either.’ I shove it into my shopping bag and straight into Panda’s eager mitts.
‘W-will that be everything?’ Danby quavers.
I stare at him and I can still feel my blood boiling at the very sight of him. Suddenly I don’t feel very merciful. I can still picture him swanning about in his black cloak with its scarlet silver lining. Flouncing about on that stage at the Christmas Hotel. I think about him and Mrs Claus being in cahoots and plotting how to slice off my head in front of everyone.
He’s dangerous. However much he’s scared of me now, squirming and just about messing his pants as I glare down at him, I know that he’s still dangerous if I leave him at large.
But what to do with the smarmy little weasel?
He interrupts my train of thought by piping up with: ‘Where’s Penny? Where’s she gone? She was a good little helper to me. She’s my niece, you know. I was looking out for her, and now I’m concerned that you have done her some harm.’
My dander goes right back up. ‘What? What makes you think I would hurt Penny?’
‘Because you’re crazy and savage, that’s why. You’re reverting to your monstrous roots, Brenda. You’re less human than you ever were! And, God help her, Penny was my assistant that night onstage at the Christmas Hotel. I imagine you’ll want revenge on her as much as on me!’
‘I would never harm a hair on that girl’s head,’ I protest. ‘She’s a good girl…’ Now he’s got me sounding like I’m protesting too much. See how he can twist things about and put you off your stroke?
‘She’s gone missing, that poor girl,’ he says. ‘I’m most concerned about her. I’ve written to her mother. I’ve talked to the police… I think something awful might have happened to her…’
‘You keep out of it, Danby,’ I warn him. ‘You must never see that girl again.’
He feigns fright and distress. ‘Oh! You’ve done away with her! You’ve killed poor, lovely Penny!’
‘I’ve done no such thing..!’ I turn to go, feeling flustered.
‘But who’ll believe you, Brenda? I’ll tell them you were in here, bragging about doing her in, and threatening me. I’ll say you’ve gone berserk and that no one is safe…!’
I turn to hurry out of there, swinging around in the small space. I bump into a side table stacked with musty hardbacks, sending them scattering. I lurch into a bookcase and it wobbles alarmingly. But I’m heading for the door and Danby’s jeers are ringing in my ears.
‘Who would believe you, Brenda? A monster come back from the dead, you are! A grave-dodger intent on revenge! No one knows where that girl has gone, Brenda! They’ll be knocking down the door of your B&B! They’ll come searching your every nook and cranny! I do hope, dear, that you’ve got nothing to hide…!’
As I exit the shop and hurry away down the street I can still hear his sniveling, conniving voice.
He’s right. He could cause a lot of trouble for me. Penny going missing is bad news.
Sometimes I wish I really was a monster. I wish I could have picked up Danby and throttled the life out of him.
§
Later, Panda and I are sitting on an empty patch of sand, right on the shore, having a quiet moment in the sun. It’s because I can’t face going back to that dusty house of mine just yet, while the sun is blazing like this.
‘Let’s face it,’ I tell him, ‘this might be my last chance to soak up the sunlight like this.’
‘Oh, do stop being so maudlin, my dear,’ he groans. He’s fully absorbed in reading the issue of ‘Tendencies’ I snatched out of Danby’s hands.
I’m lying back in the soft sand, listening to the hiss and rush of the waves coming in. The whole of Whitby is at our backs. That jumble of streets and houses and pubs and hotels that I have made my home for these past six years. The dark headland rises to one side, the west cliffs to the oth
er. From here, though, I can see nothing but the restless sea. I feel like I could lie here all day and night, willing the cool and frothy tide to rush in and wash me away. It might be rather nice to give up all volition, all control, and be set free upon the mercy of the waves. I might be borne away and washed up later in some new place and have to find a wholly new life.
But I don’t think it would work like that. Even if the sea took me, it would surely spit me back out here in Whitby. I have a destiny to face up to right here.
I sigh and open my eyes to the fathomless blue sky.
‘How are you getting on, Panda? What do you think of Robert’s story?’
‘Erm,’ he says, ‘I’m not sure. He’s got quite a personable, casual style, but he does tend to ramble on a bit.’
‘But what’s it about?’ I ask impatiently.
‘It’s about how he once worked at a hotel where it was Christmas every day, and how the horrible, grotesque owner made all the boys she employed dress up as elves. And how he worked there with his poor auntie, whose job it was to serve high tea in the main lounge. It’s all about how his aunty kept going out to have these amazing beauty treatments at a miraculous boutique…’
I’m sitting up in the sand and staring at him. ‘What?’
‘It goes on,’ says Panda. ‘And I’m not sure you’re going to like the next bit. It’s about how Robert comes into contact with a woman who owns a B&B near the harbour. A woman who’s nearly seven foot tall in her black beehive wig, who covers up terrible scars on her face and body with thick make-up…’
‘B-but that’s me!’ I burst out. ‘He’s writing about me!’
Panda nods grimly. ‘I thought as much. It seems too close to life to be made up.’
I hold out my hand for the slim volume. I flick though quickly, uncomprehendingly, staring at the tiny, closely-printed text.
‘These are my secrets… he’s giving away all my secrets in here…’
There are ten pages of the journal given over to Robert’s story, which is called ‘The Deadly Boutique.’ I flip to the front and see the issue’s theme is ‘The Return of the Repressed’.
‘I’ll give him repressed…’ I mutter, and feel a black, terrible anger building up in me.
What could he be thinking of? How could he betray me like this? Robert has been one of my closest friends, ever since I first came to this town and started to get to know other people. When I first felt that it was safe for me to stop being so isolated in my own separate world, it was Robert who was one of the few who taught me it was okay to trust other people.
But now here I am, printed up on these pages. This woman talks like me, he describes me just as I am. He even makes me sound a bit ungainly and unflattering. He makes me sound like a comic char lady at times, with my fussing about the cleanliness of my establishment and how I like things to be just so. All that is fine, though, compared with the bits when he gets into my mysterious past. Robert thinks he is inside my head, narrating my thoughts as if straight from my mind. He dwells on this character – this woman he’s chosen to call Bessie – and how she remembers only certain patches of her very long life. And how she is plagued by dreams about her creation – and the hands of a crazy, brilliant scientist. A madman who, over two hundred years ago, rented out a castle on a far Scottish isle in order to make a bride for the male monster he had already brought to life.
Here it all is. The monologue of a survivor of a long and terrible life. Written up secretly, surreptitiously, sneakily by Robert.
In the very back of ‘Tendencies’ it says that he lives and works in Whitby, where he is the acting manager of the Miramar Hotel. The story included in this number of the journal is a work of fiction, and any likeness to anyone living or undead is purely coincidental. Also, the chapter comes from a novel that Robert is working on. A novel that will contain further revelations about the afterlife of Bessie, the secret Bride of Frankenstein.
I drop the slim volume onto the sand and for a moment I’m reeling with dizziness. There’s a sudden chilly draft coming in from the sea, and I’ve got those black circles in my vision again as my blood pressure shoots up. I’ve got to calm down; I can’t get worked up. It’s only a little while since I was horribly injured. I’m still recovering and I can’t afford to upset myself. But I’m seeing sunspots and my sudden nausea is accompanied by a wave of what I can only call existential angst. Have I really been reading about a semi-fictionalised me? Or has Robert made that all up and I’m only imagining that it somehow is a part of my life? It’s all too fanciful, surely, to be true? Aren’t I just another dear old landlady in a little seaside town? Do I really have scars and secrets and a past life that could fill any number of editions of ‘Tendencies’ ?
Panda looks alarmed at my sudden psychological crisis on the sand. ‘Brenda dear, snap out of it! It’s no good crying over spilled milk!’
‘But he was my friend, Panda. I trusted him with all my secrets…’
Panda snorts and rubs his ears thoughtfully. ‘Well, look at me and Effie. Once upon a time I was her only friend, wasn’t I? She didn’t need anyone else to confide in. But now..! She can hardly look at me when we’re in the same room. She hardly even believes in me anymore.’
I’m surprised by this. ‘Really? But that’s daft. She’s heard you talking and everything.’
‘She thinks it’s you doing my voice. Ventriloquizing through me. She thinks it’s part of the trauma you suffered when your head got chopped off.’
I stare with incredulity at Panda. ‘She thinks you’re me?’ Unbelievable! Are none of my friends exactly how I think they are?
Then I become aware of someone heading towards us across the sand. There’s a shimmer of heat haze and it’s as if she’s hovering over the beach. Effie’s wearing a scarlet duffel coat and marching purposefully to where we are lying.
‘I was up at abbey,’ she says. ‘I could see the whole town. And there you were lying on the sand. I could see who it was immediately. So I thought I’d come down to see you.’
‘What were you doing at the abbey?’ Panda asks her and when she replies, I notice that she looks at me rather than him. So it’s true! She thinks I’m speaking through him, for some daft reason!
‘Oh, I was just checking it out. Seeing that there wasn’t evidence of, you know, activity.’
I frown. ‘What kind of activity?’
‘Oh, you know. Any sacrificial… stuff, lying about. Any sign of preparations for tomorrow night.’
‘Tomorrow night!’ I gasp. ‘It’s the last day of August tomorrow.’
Effie nods. ‘The clock is ticking, Brenda. We’re running out of time.’
‘You really think the ghosts will come? They’ll be able to get me up there at the Abbey and they’ll be able to do away with me?’
‘I don’t know,’ says Effie grimly. ‘Honestly, ducky, if I knew what they were planning in all its specifics, then I would tell you. I really would.’
‘Hmpf,’ says Panda. I stand up on the sand and brush my skirt and cardigan free of crumbly sand. I pop ‘Tendencies’ back into my shopping bag. For a moment I was tempted to tell Effie all about it. I wanted to offload my shock and distress at being exposed like this. But then I think again. Effie needs no excuse to slag off Robert. She could quite easily revive her original, low opinion of him. So I keep it to myself and stow the book away.
He must have a reason. There must be an excuse for this. He must have been writing this thing because he thought it would help me. Perhaps he thought he could get people to sympathise with me, or understand me. Not that I’d ever want to take that risk. All I ever wanted was a quiet life. I never wanted anyone to know anything about me. There’s no way I’d ever agree to the kind of thing he’s written in that book. Now I’m hoping that he was doing it out of the best of motives. He’s a kind boy, a loyal and loving boy. There must have been a reason for d
oing this to me.
‘Shall I walk back home with you?’ Effie asks me.
I pop Panda in my bag and smile. ‘Yes, of course,’ I tell her, and together we make our way to the dock and back to the gap between the houses and the bustle of Church Street. As we dawdle towards home, Effie says, ‘So – there’s been no sign of our young friends, then? They’ve not made their way back from the land of fairies, or whatever they call it?’
‘The land of Faery,’ I correct her. ‘A much darker, stranger place than anything to do with any kind of fairies you might know.’
Effie shrugs and her face clouds over as we walk along, side by side. Not for the first time I wonder about her being the daughter of the Erl King. I wonder what kind of weird magic that gives her access to; and what kind of powers that means she has. Powers that she might not even know about yet. Oh, she’s always been very deep, has Effie.
‘Whatever you call it,’ she goes on. ‘I take it the youngsters haven’t returned from there yet?’
I shake my head. ‘I’m afraid not.’
‘They’ve only got until tomorrow,’ she says, quite unnecessarily. ‘Anyway, it’s probably best that they don’t turn up. I think they’d cause even more ructions than we’re already going to have.’
We cross the harbour bridge in a silence that we maintain all the way back to our respective dwellings. Neither of us, it seems, feel like talking about the coming denouement.
§
I decide to have an early night. I think tomorrow is likely to be a somewhat challenging day, and I’ll need all my strength.
For a while, though, I sit quietly in my attic sitting room, taking stock. I’m thinking about the few short years I have made this my home. Everything here suits me so perfectly. My little flat under the eaves is so familiar to me, so perfect, that I feel as though I have never lived anywhere else.
The shelves and bits of furniture are covered with nick-nacks and souvenirs to remind me of days out and escapades I have enjoyed and / or survived in Whitby. There’s the brass pot containing the ashes of a portion of an enchanted Egyptian princess, standing on top of the fire surround. Here’s the shriveled remains of a monkey’s paw which once granted bizarre wishes. And, beside it on the wall unit, hidden inside a fancy box, the glass eye of Hans Macabre – one of the most deadly fiends my friends and I have defeated.
