by Stephen Laws
And waited.
Fifteen
When Matt finally awoke, it took him a long while to realise where he was and what had happened. It was dark. He appeared to have been crammed into a tight space and he could not move his arms or legs. Then he became aware that he was in a car. He could hear the engine, feel the movement below him. For an instant, there was a spear of light before him and he could see a cross-section of rubbery lines; a stamped-out cigarette butt. Then he realised where he was: in the back seat of his own taxi. He recognised the rubber mat on the floor, which had taken him so long to hose down when that smart bint had puked all over it last year. He was pushed down under the back seat of his own taxi and could not remember how the hell he had got there. Something was wrong. He could see a woman’s leg in front of him. He tried to move. In the next instant, something sharp was being thrust savagely against his neck. He tried to make an outraged protest, but the sharp point pressed even harder. He knew that it had drawn blood. Matt had only known terror like this once before. During his National Service days, he had been swinging across a gully on a length of rope as part of an assault course. The rope had tangled around his legs and he had swung back and forth over the gully, convinced that he was going to fall; that he was going to die. He had the same feeling now as the sharp tip gouged his throat. He ceased to struggle and kept perfectly still. The pressure at his throat eased a little. From somewhere above him, he could hear the little girl giggling and, suddenly, he remembered his pick-up at the Central Station. He remembered the smiling man and his smiling wife. The little girl who giggled in the back seat. And he remembered taking the turning off to stop at the shop for the man. It was the last thing that he remembered. Matt clenched and unclenched his fists, felt the fabric of whatever it was that they had tied him up with, suddenly realising that it was the length of washing line that he always kept in the boot to tie luggage onto the roof-rack. He supposed that the woman or the man must have hit him with something, for he could feel a dull aching on the back of his head and something dried and crusted on his neck, which he knew could only be dried blood.
The car went over a bump in the road, the impact knocking the wind from Matt’s lungs. He wondered how long they had been travelling, and the sudden metallic click from the dashboard told him that the man had not turned off the clock. A crackling from the radio, and Matt recognised Sylvia’s voice from the office.
‘Matt? Where the hell are you?’ Silence. And then: ‘Matt! You know you’ve got a pick-up at 2.30. Please confirm that your Jesmond pick-up is completed.’ Another pause and Matt could just imagine Sylvia sitting at the switchboard, chewing gum, reading Woman’s Own and getting more heated as he failed to answer. He had a pick-up at 2.30. It must be pretty near to that time now. He had made the Central Station pickup at 11.00am. Christ! They had been driving for hours. He had been out for all that time. Where the hell were they taking him? Matt tried to squirm round so that he could get a better view. Instantly, the sharp point was pressing hard against his throat. He stopped moving. He had gained an inch, could see the top of the driving seat and could just make out the still, implacable head of the man as the radio crackled into life again: ‘Matt! You’re going to be in trouble if you don’t answer.’ A sudden mumbling of voices in the office, and Matt could just overhear Sylvia saying to someone: ‘I don’t think he’s in the car. I think he’s just parked it somewhere and buggered off.’ And then, he could hear a male voice (he didn’t know whose) mumbling something: ‘. . . like him . . . pub.’ Matt wanted to scream at her: You stupid bint! I’m not at the pub, I haven’t buggered off! I’m in the car with three bloody loonies! And I’ve been kidnapped or something! But the sharp point against his throat prevented him from making any sound. Another click, and he realised that the man had switched the radio off.
The car was swinging round now, turning off the main highway. As the centre of gravity shifted, Matt felt himself sliding further down toward the floor. The pressure on his throat began to ease again. He had a sudden glimpse of a Texaco gas pump in the top left hand corner of the windscreen and realised that they were pulling in somewhere for gas. Suddenly oblivious to his danger, he began to struggle upwards. A small, slender hand knotted in his thick, black curly hair, yanking him backwards; and the point was at his throat again, only harder and with a brutality that meant business. Christ! thought Matt. She’s going to kill me! He could hear the little girl giggling again. A bead of blood trickled down his neck as he heard the driver’s door open and the man get out. Matt listened, his heartbeat thudding desperately in his chest as the man moved to the gas pump. He heard the clunking rattle as the man unhooked the hose. A scrabbling at the gas tank as the hose was fitted. Self service, thought Matt desperately. Oh, God, it’s self service and no one’s going to see me. He could hear the gas surging into the tank. After a while, there was another clunk as the hose was pulled away and returned to its bracket. Silence. Matt could imagine the man walking over to the office. In his mind’s eye, he saw the man enter, stand in the line. He could see the fat, balding assistant behind the counter flashing a smile at the man as he looked out into the forecourt and saw the taxi sitting there; saw the woman and her daughter sitting composed in the back seat, unaware that they were keeping a big, ex-National Service man stuffed down between them with a knife at his throat.
‘How’s business?’ Matt could imagine the Fat Man saying.
‘Not so bad,’ replied the Man with the Smile.
‘Haven’t left your meter running, have you?’
‘Some chance. That bitch has been watching the clock ever since I picked her up. Expect the kid’ll have chocolate all over the back seat by now.’
The Man with the Smile was paying for his gas and the Fat Man was smiling as he handed over the change, wishing him a nice day. And now the Man with the Smile was coming back. Matt heard the car door open, heard the Man climb into the car. Seconds later, the engine was gunning into life and the car pulled out of the station and onto the highway again, heading for its unknown destination. For the first time in his life, Matt fainted.
Sixteen
Mark pulled away from Aynsley with a force that made Chadderton unconsciously tighten his grip on Joanne’s arm. The dark strands of sweat-soaked hair plastered across his forehead made him look like some pearl diver who had been underwater for too long and had suddenly surfaced, gasping for air. He took a step back, arms still held out towards Aynsley. Joanne called his name softly and bitterly, as if he were suddenly lost to her. Aynsley’s claw-like hand remained outstretched and Chadderton could see that his eyes had rolled up into his head, the whites glinting dull in the now faded daylight: pinpoints of light in a tattered, ragged mass.
‘Standing stones,’ said Mark in a hoarse, choked voice which Chadderton barely recognised.
‘Now you know all I can give you,’ said Aynsley slowly and gutturally. The hand flopped to the carpet and there was an expression on Aynsley’s face which could have been a token smile or a hideous grimace. ‘All used up . . . all used up . . .’
Mark backed to the bed and sat down beside Joanne, heavily enough to make a gout of whisky slosh from the neck of the bottle across Chadderton’s legs. He was still looking at the broken rag doll on the floor as he pulled Joanne close to him. Her arms went round his neck, face buried into his chest. Chadderton released the woman, looked back at Aynsley and in that instant knew that something was going to happen. The nerves in the arm which had touched Mark were aching with a dull, nagging pain. He could feel something wrong in the air and for a second, the horrified thought came to him that reality was about to slip away yet again. Next to him, he became aware that Davies had sensed the same thing and was holding his wife even more tightly.
Aynsley’s face was still contorted in a fixed smile or grimace, lips drawn back from yellowed teeth, skin wrinkled and cracked like the visage of some huge Capo Di Monte figurine. In the dark
ness, Chadderton could see that his head was sagging slightly. And now, there was some kind of movement around his chest. The ragged shirt front was moving . . . no, not moving. It was smoke. Thin wisps of oily black smoke were drifting around his torso, from his shirt, from inside his jacket. Dirty, black tendrils of smoke, shifting and twisting upwards like small black serpents. A smell of ozone seemed to hang heavily in the air. Chadderton became aware that a dark, bluish light was beginning to suffuse the room. It made him think of the time he had lain blind drunk in a second-rate hotel in Leeds. The blue neon hotel sign was just below his bedroom window and lit up the darkness of his room with a cold, blue, bloodless light. The same unhealthy blue light was now spreading through the room, creeping along the walls and throwing sharp angular shadows up the bedroom walls and over the furniture. Three faces shone deathly blue in the reflected hue, like corpses three days in the water. Now, Chadderton realised that the light was coming from Aynsley. And it was somehow a dark light. Aynsley lay in the same position, a phosphorescent blue surrounding him, like ice on fire, issuing from him as dark snakes curled from his shirt front, casting a brighter flicker of light across the psychiatrist’s ghastly, frozen features. The flame burst and flared, smoke billowed thick and black and, in seconds, Aynsley’s body was burning.
‘Oh no . . . not again,’ moaned Joanne, giving voice to the inner horror which had suddenly revived in all three of them. Blue flames crackled and spread. In seconds, all sight of Aynsley’s body was consumed by flame. Held frozen in horror, they watched the burning man-shape in the corner of the room. Too horrified to react, they could not see that the flames which crackled and swirled around Aynsley were not spreading to the rest of the room; that although the flames were licking at the bedroom window curtains, the fabric of the curtains did not ignite. The burning mass was crumbling now, the sagging ball of flame which had once been a head was caving in, falling away. The body was disintegrating and shrivelling. In another instant, the flames were gone. The thick black smoke was disappearing. Fading into nothingness and leaving no trace. A pile of charcoaled ashes smouldered in the corner and a yellow substance trickled greasily on the wall where Aynsley had been propped, crackling in the heat. A single, blackened shoe poked incongruously from the ruined mass which had once been a man.
Chadderton felt the spell break. They were all back to reality. The nightmare had ended. The grisly remains on the carpet were the only proof of what they had been through. Chadderton found his feet, moved quickly to the light switch beside the bedroom door and flicked it on. Light would chase the shadows away forever. He turned back as the room lit up; the smouldering pile still lay in the corner, specks of soot dancing in the air.
And despite himself, Chadderton realised that the nightmare had not ended. Something inside told him that the real nightmare, the nightmare to end all nightmares, had not yet even begun.
It was dark when Matt awoke. They were travelling over rough ground, jolting and bumping. His mouth felt baked dry and salty, and he realised that the woman’s hand was still clenched in his hair. It was not a dream. He groaned aloud and felt the grip tighten as the car swung round a tight curve and began bouncing over even rougher terrain. There were no streetlights to brighten the interior of the car as they moved. From the dashboard, Matt heard a metallic click. The meter was still on. That’s some fare they’re gonna have to pay, a small, frightened voice tried to joke in the back of his mind.
‘Look . . .’ he said, the words croaking in the back of his parched throat, ‘. . . look . . . if it’s the money you want, just take it. There’s not much but you’re welcome to it. There’s a wallet in my jerkin pocket, ’bout twenty quid. You don’t need me for anything.’ The little girl began to giggle. The man and woman remained silent. ‘What is this? Kidnapping?’ Again the giggling; again the silence. ‘You’ve got to be kidding, mister. Kidnapping? Me? I’m just a taxi driver scratching around for a living. I’m worth nothing, zero . . . Nobody’s going to pay anything to get me back . . . nobody I know’s got anything. So come on, mister. Just let me out. You can have the car . . .’
Suddenly the car had stopped. The woman’s grip twisted, making Matt cry out in pain, and then forced his head downwards again. Boiling rage, heedless of the consequences, began to take over inside him. He started to struggle upwards, but at the same moment he sensed that the man in the driving seat was leaning over towards him. There was a sharp blow on the side of his head and the interior of the car was suddenly lit up by a cloud of sparks. In a dream, Matt heard the car door open and felt cool night air blowing on his face as he was dragged out. The ground swung up to meet him and he noticed in a curiously detached way that it consisted of churned-up mud and grass. He was being carried now. Someone had his legs, someone else was struggling with his head and shoulders. The moon seesawed crazily across the sky and then everything went black again.
Philip and Grace had studied the map very carefully on the train. Emble Cottage was two miles out of Bamburgh, easily reached and with good access to the town but remote enough to give them all the privacy they needed for a nice break in the country. The long drive from Newcastle had been made in silence. There was no need for words. Everything had already been said. They had been told everything. They were one. And, smiling all the time, they had finally arrived in Bamburgh, taking the route into rougher country to find Emble Cottage nestling in trees at the summit of a rise overlooking the surrounding countryside.
Still smiling, Philip carried the bulky form of the taxi driver to the front door of the cottage. He groped for the key in his pocket, found it and opened the door. The lights were working. Just as the brochure had said: everything in readiness for their arrival. Angelina ran in ahead of them, clapping her hands and spinning a little dance in the centre of the room. It was perfect. Just perfect. Low oak beams supported the ceiling. And all this . . . this . . . olde worlde furniture. Angelina turned back to look as her Mummy and Daddy dragged the big fat man into the centre of the room and left him on the floor. He was beginning to moan as Daddy ran quickly to the car for their suitcases. Mummy was hunting for the central heating controls; had found the thermostat and was turning it on.
The fat man was burbling baby words. Daddy came back to the cottage and shut the front door on the cold night outside. Angelina ran to him and he embraced her. Excitedly, she looked up into his eyes, expectation written all over her small face. And now Daddy was nodding indulgently, meaning that it was time. They could do it now. Angelina ran into the kitchen to see that Mummy was already preparing things. She ran to help her. Mummy had found the kitchen drawer where all the cooking utensils were kept and was rummaging through it. Between them, they selected two bread knives, a cleaver from the rack above the sink, an old steak knife with a broken tip but a sharp cutting edge, and a skewer. Grace found the most important thing of all in her handbag.
A needle and a reel of nylon thread.
They moved back into the front room. Smiling, always smiling. Daddy had taken off his coat and was standing over the taxi man who was waking up. That was good.
Azimuth was speaking to them again. They could hear all the words. He was hungry. He needed to feast on the fat man’s fear. And then he would tell them their part in the Arrival.
Not a snack this time, thought Angelina. But a long, slow meal.
Matt finally woke up.
The horror began.
It took him two days to die.
Seventeen
Mark, Chadderton and Joanne exchanged no words as they drove to the General Hospital that night. Joanne had started humming; a small, childlike lullaby as she cradled her daughter in the back seat of the car. Helen had slept through the nightmare of the burning, was still sleeping as they arrived at the hospital, and was admitted for shock. Chadderton did all the talking. There had been an accident. Mother and daughter had been in a car smash while returning from a shopping trip. Mother had hit her head on th
e windshield, daughter had been severely shaken up. Joanne had insisted that she was all right as she was given treatment for the cut on her head, and then had collapsed as her daughter was taken away. Joanne was admitted, too. Also suffering from shock. Chadderton had flashed his ID, the Nurse-on-Duty had failed to notice that it was no longer valid, and the necessary forms had been filled in.
Silently, Mark and Chadderton walked back to the car. In the car park, Mark suddenly broke down, one hand covering his face, his shoulders convulsing as sobbing racked his body. Tears flowed freely between his fingers. He had not cried that way since he had been a child. Chadderton moved on to the car, lighting a cigarette with fingers that shook badly, allowing Mark the privacy of a grief that was more like relief.
