Marianne Dreams

by Catherine Storr; Susannah Harker

  ‘Supposing,’ Marianne thought, as she settled herself for sleep that night, ‘I can’t bicycle now, in the dream? I shouldn’t be able to go with Mark when he’s ready. And I haven’t bicycled since I was ill, so I might not be able to. But I can walk there and I can’t here, so perhaps I can ride a bicycle there, though I’m not allowed to here. Anyway, I’m sure Mark wouldn’t go and leave me in the house all by myself.’

  She found herself, as she had known she would, in the hall, in front of her bicycle, which was propped up against a wall. As far as she could tell it was complete, including the basket. She gave an experimental spin to the back wheel, and was just going upstairs when a noise attracted her attention. It was not the radio: but from the front room to the right of the stairs, came a whirring sound which Marianne could not identify.

  ‘It’s THEM!’ was her immediate thought. ‘They’ve got in and they’re doing something in there. I wonder if that’s the sort of noise a time-bomb makes. I must go and warn Mark.’

  But before she had reached more than half-way up the stairs the noise stopped. The door of the room opened and Mark came out. He walked slowly but steadily to the door of the room opposite, opened it, and then, without seeing Marianne, went back into the room he had just come from. There was a sound of scraping, of something heavy being set down with a thud and then suddenly a flurry of broken china, and Mark rode out of one door, on his bicycle, and across the hall and into the room opposite. A moment later he was back in the hall again and had disappeared into the room he had come from. There was a sound of more china breaking; and Mark’s voice said, ‘Bother these eggs!’

  Marianne clapped her hands as if she were applauding at a play.

  Mark’s head appeared out of the door; his face wore a slightly alarmed expression, which changed to relief when he saw Marianne.

  ‘Hullo! I didn’t know you’d got here! Did you see the round tour?’

  ‘Yes, it’s marvellous! You must have been practising awfully hard.’

  ‘I have. Like to see me do it again?’ ‘Yes, please.’

  She followed him into the room and saw the bicycle on its stand surrounded by broken china and squashed hard-boiled eggs.

  ‘It is rather a mess,’ Mark said apologetically. ‘But there isn’t much room, and if I start trying to get out of their way I fall off. When I broke them the first time I was in an awful state about it, but the next day they were all there just as good as ever, so now I don’t bother about them.’

  He lifted the bicycle to the ground.

  ‘Stand clear! Run after me and you can see.’

  He repeated the route he had taken before. This time he did not get off when he reached his starting-point, but went on riding until he had been in and out of each room half a dozen times. When he finally dismounted Marianne was surprised to see that he did not seem tired or breathless.

  ‘All right,’ Mark said, stretching his arms and legs. ‘Let’s go upstairs. The chicken’s up there already.’

  He walked upstairs vigorously too, his right leg only a very little less active than his left. When they were back in his room, sitting on the side of his bed and eating the chicken, Marianne said, ‘You’ve got on awfully quickly, Mark.’

  ‘Do you think so?’ he said. ‘I’ve practised like anything since you were here last. I suppose I haven’t done so badly.’

  ‘Then can we go?’

  ‘Go?’

  ‘Get out of here. Go to the lighthouse. I do think we ought to, Mark. I’m sure it isn’t safe to stay.’

  ‘You’re in such a hurry,’ Mark complained. ‘I’ve only just started really riding the bike. I ought to do a bit more practice first.’

  ‘I think we ought to go now,’ Marianne insisted. ‘Why the hurry?’

  ‘It’s partly a feeling, partly that I know it isn’t safe to stay here. Every time I come back here it feels more dangerous: and we do know that - that THEY are getting closer. Why won’t you go?’

  ‘Because I’m not ready yet’ Mark said irritably. ‘You want to rush things so. Anyhow you don’t know that THEY are any closer this time. You haven’t looked yet.’

  ‘Have you?’

  ‘No. I tell you, I’m not interested in them. I just want to get absolutely back to normal here, then I’ll go like a shot.’

  ‘I’m going to look now,’ Marianne said. She could see that Mark was too much excited by his newly found powers on the bicycle to be able to think of anything else.

  She went over to the window and looked carefully out. The usual half-light prevailed outside; beyond the garden fence were now not just a few, but ranks of Watchers: the fence had been completely broken down in several places and now only a few yards from the house were five or six enormous stones. But what frightened Marianne, more even than their proximity, was the air of expectancy, of waiting for some event just about to happen, which she could sense from one quick glance. The eyes, she thought, moved a fraction more quickly, the eyeballs swung to and fro as if the Watchers were aware that the activity inside the house had increased, and they were more alert themselves to guard against it.

  ‘Mark!’ Marianne said, coming back to the bed and instinctively dropping her voice. ‘They are much nearer. They’re almost up to the house and they look more awake. More as if they were waiting to catch us’

  ‘Let me look’ Mark said. Less cautious than Marianne, he walked up to the middle of the window but almost immediately drew sharply to the side, and then came slowly back to the bed.

  ‘Well?’ Marianne asked.

  ‘I must say I’d forgotten how beastly THEY are’ Mark admitted.

  ‘And there are a lot of them very close, aren’t there?’

  ‘Yes, they are a bit too close.’

  ‘Then don’t you think we ought to go?’

  ‘I - don’t - know’ Mark said slowly. ‘I don’t want to try to get out and find I can’t make it, but I agree with you, I don’t want to stay here longer than we can help.’ ‘What shall we do then?’

  ‘Let’s wait till it’s dark and then decide. If THEY come any nearer before then we’ll know how fast they’re moving and we can think what’s best to do.’

  ‘When will it be dark?’ Marianne asked.

  ‘I don’t know’ Mark said. ‘I never know here. Sometimes when I’m here it’s light all the time, and other times it’s mostly dark and sometimes it changes. We’ll have to wait and see.’

  Marianne had never been in the house for so long before: nor had any time of waiting seemed so endless as the long day that dragged on as she and Mark waited for the night to come. Sitting on the bed, on the floor, on the stairs for a change, they played all the card games they knew, they played draughts, they played chess, they played Monopoly twice through, they even played noughts and crosses. Every now and then one of them would take a quick survey through a window, careful to keep out of sight themselves. The Watchers seemed to be no nearer; but even Mark admitted to feeling their unrest and expectancy. The atmosphere in the house grew tense: both Mark and Marianne became more bored and irritable as time passed and the half-light outside persisted in its pale hard sameness. It seemed as if the dark would never come.

  ‘You can’t move your king and your castle together after the king has been checked’ Mark said sharply, as they were playing their third game of very inexpert chess.

  ‘Yes, I can! It doesn’t make any difference whether he’s been checked or not!’

  ‘No, it’s one of the rules that you can’t castle if your king has been in check.’

  ‘But I always play like this.’

  ‘Then you always play wrong’ said Mark disagreeably. ‘I don’t! Anyhow, my father taught me how to play and he knows better than you.’

  ‘Then your father simply doesn’t know the rules any more than you do.’

  ‘He does! And anyhow I’m going to castle’ Marianne said, moving the pieces.

  ‘You can’t! Put them back and play properly!’

  ‘I won�
�t.’

  ‘All right then, I will,’ Mark said. He leant across and reached for Marianne’s king. At the same moment Marianne moved the board sideways to get it out of his reach. Mark’s arm caught the taller pieces and swept them to the floor.

  ‘Now look what you’ve done!’ Marianne said triumphantly.

  ‘You’re obviously,’ Mark said, in a voice that trembled with rage and sarcasm, ‘much too young to play an adult game like chess. I should think tiddlywinks would be much more suitable for your age.’

  He slid off the bed, with the chessmen’s box in his hand and felt about for the pieces that had dropped. Suddenly, in a completely different tone, he said, ‘Marianne!’

  ‘What?’ said Marianne, still furious.

  ‘I can’t see properly to pick the chessmen up.’

  Marianne looked quickly round the room and out of the window and saw that at last the pale light had begun to fade. Outside it was like a winter twilight: in the room it was already so dark that, as Mark had said, it was difficult to distinguish one object from another.

  ‘It’s getting dark!’ she breathed.

  Mark retrieved the last chessmen and stood up.

  ‘Thank goodness for that. We seem to have been waiting hours. Now what?’

  He slid the chessmen back into their box.

  ‘I think we ought to turn the radio on.’

  ‘Oh, no!’ Marianne cried out. ‘Don’t let’s have it! It’s horrible! It frightens me!’

  ‘Yes, I know. But it could be useful. Don’t you remember what you said the first time we heard it? It tells us what THEY are thinking.’

  He left the room and Marianne heard him go into the room opposite. He was back immediately.

  ‘I do think you’re brave!’ Marianne said. ‘I hate going into that room.’

  For answer Mark only held up his finger to encourage her to listen. Quietly at first, then louder and louder, came the intermittent booming, broken into almost distinguishable words and behind it the continuous sibilant rustle of dry grass, dead leaves or snakes crossing dusty earth.

  Marianne shivered. Unexpectedly Mark put an arm roughly round her shoulders for a moment.

  ‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘THEY’re outside still, you know. And the light will be here in a minute.’

  He had hardly said the words when the booming voices rose in pitch and excitement, became more discordant and more distinct in their protest. ‘Not the light! Not the light! Not the light!’ And then, in the silence of the boom and the rustle, as the golden glow went past, Marianne and Mark heard not only the joyful music from the distance, but also, in the music, a voice, a voice to be implicitly trusted, believed in and followed. It said, ‘Go. Now. Go. Now. Go. Now. Go.’

  As the light fled and the disturbed protesting hum returned, Mark said, ‘All right. I think you were right. Let’s go-‘ ‘Now?’

  ‘As soon as we can. Come on.’

  ‘But, Mark! You’ve only got pyjamas! And we haven’t packed the bicycle baskets! And we’ve eaten the chicken!’

  ‘We’ll take sausages and eggs,’ Mark said practically. ‘I expect I’ll be all right in pyjamas. Anyway, I haven’t got anything else - unless you’ve drawn me something?’

  ‘I’m sorry, I never thought about it. And, Mark, we haven’t -‘

  ‘Look!’ said Mark, sternly. ‘You’ve been saying all the time we ought to go and there isn’t much time and it’s dangerous to stay here. Now I’m agreeing with you. I think it’s dangerous. Too dangerous to stay any longer. We’ve got to get out now, while we can, I’m sure of that. But now you’re trying to wait about and put off going. Come on, Marianne! It may be beastly getting out, but I’m sure it would be even more beastly if we stayed.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Marianne. ‘Let’s go’

  ‘Can you see the sausages or the eggs?’

  ‘No. But I can feel them. I’ve got all the sausages and about four eggs. I can’t carry any more.’

  ‘Good. Let’s go down then.’

  ‘Mark, wouldn’t it be a good idea -‘

  She broke off as the sounds from the radio increased in volume again. ‘Not the light! Not the light!’ said some of the voices: but others, joining in the discordant chorus said, ‘What? Look out! What? Look out!’ Then the music followed, and the great voice said, more urgently this time than before, ‘Go. Now. Go. Now. Go. Now. Now. Now. Now.’

  Marianne and Mark moved simultaneously to the door. On the way Marianne remembered what she had just been going to say.

  ‘Mark!’ she whispered. ‘Wouldn’t it be a good idea to take a blanket with us? In case you’re cold?’ ‘Jolly good. Come on, I’ve got it’

  They went downstairs, stepping quietly without meaning to, as if the booming, whispering radio set upstairs could hear them.

  ‘Have you found your bike?’ Mark hissed.

  ‘No, not yet. Bother. Yes, I have. I scraped against it’

  ‘Put the food in your basket and I’ll take the blanket if I can.’

  Marianne heard the crunch of eggshells and broken china as Mark groped his way through the room to his bicycle. A minute later she heard the soft click of well-oiled wheels as he wheeled it out to her in the hall.

  ‘Ready?’ he whispered.

  ‘Yes. But, Mark, how are we going to do it?’

  ‘Open the door when the light’s there and make a dash for it while THEY have their beastly eyes shut’

  ‘Will we have time, do you think? With bicycles?’

  ‘We’ll have to go one at a time. Listen to the radio and be ready to go directly THEY stop talking. That’d give one of us time to get out with a bicycle.’

  ‘What about the other one?’

  ‘The first one to go must lie down in the grass to hide. Outside the gate if they can get there. We’ll be able to see because of the light.’

  ‘Who’s to go first?’

  ‘Would you rather? I will if you like’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Marianne said. ‘I’d hate to be left - Mark! The light!’

  Upstairs the radio, booming and rustling, was sending out the clearest words they had yet heard. ‘Not the light! Not the light!’ said one chorus. ‘Look! Watch! Look! Watch!’ said another. And a new mutter, very low and quiet, but full of menace. ‘Get them! Get them! Get them!’

  If Marianne had had time to listen she would never have had the courage, hearing those voices, to go. But as they rose in pitch and stopped, Mark had pulled open the door, pushed her out with her bicycle and shut the door behind her. There were four or five yards of shadow immediately outside the house: beyond lay the turning light. Marianne ran to the gate, trying not to see the stony watchers all around, each quivering stony eyelid held fast shut against the light: she wrenched it open, saw the shaft of light move and a wall of darkness approach, threw the bicycle away from her and flung herself down in the long grass.

  In the total darkness which followed she could hear the hiss of the hostile grass which hid her. Low angry mutterings and stealthy movements on all sides and, louder than any of these, the quick beat of her own heart like a drum roll in her ears.

  She wondered if she could bear to lie there, without moving, unable to see, in the country of the enemy: but the fear that made her want to run away kept her still. The seconds passed: Marianne, hardly knowing it, counted sixty heart-beats. Then the grass rustled louder, more sibilantly,

  the movements stopped and the muttering rumbled louder: raising her head a little, Marianne saw a great fan-shaped area of yellow light sweep round from a tower up high, far away. An instant later she was lying in a field of golden grass, and she saw Mark slip neatly out of the house door, wheel his bicycle to the gate, between the stone figures, and throw himself, as she had done, into hiding before the shaft of light had gone.

  In the new darkness she wriggled across to the point where she had seen Mark last.

  ‘Mark!’ she whispered very low.

  ‘Marianne! Be careful. There are lots of THEM
round us!’ ‘When shall we go?’

  ‘Move a little. Every time the light comes. When THEY can’t see us. Get ready next time. Towards the light. Meet on the road!’

  ‘Bicycle?’

  ‘Not yet. Not safe. Just wheel.’

  They lay silent. Marianne wondered if their conversation had been covered by the hiss of the grass; or had it been transmitted to the Watchers by the whispering stalks? She could hear the voice of the radio booming above the stealthy sounds round her, and as the light approached again, the voices had new words. ‘Look! Watch! Look! Watch!’ they said, as before: and ‘Where? Gone! Where? Gone! Get them! Get them! Get them!’ Then all together, ‘Not the light! Not the light! Not the light!’

  It was the signal. Marianne crawled to her bicycle, picked it up and was running with it, as well as she could, as soon and as long as the beam was on her. She ran towards the source of light, over stony, uneven ground, pushing her way against the grass, which beat on her skirt and whipped her legs with little stinging lashes. She had also to look, as she ran, for the Watchers, grouped here and there, now in twos, now in sevens or eights. She was still not far from the house when the light passed and she lay again on the ground. From the panting breathing she could hear not far off, she imagined that Mark was somewhere near: but she dared not speak. She had not had time to see clearly how she was surrounded as she had thrown herself down. She put out a hand and touched stones and earth; then the long harsh stalks of the grass: then her fingers met something cold, damp, unyielding, and yet in some indescribable way alive. She felt the withdrawal, the shrinking of the stone and had snatched back her hand before the Thing cried out. For, as if her touching it had set off some alarm, suddenly the air all around her was filled with a vibration, a savage horrifying roar of fear and hate, which Marianne could feel beating against her ear-drums and temples, but yet could not hear as she could hear the savage hiss of the grass rising to a shrill whistle, and the boom from the radio in the house behind her.

  She felt Mark’s hand on her arm.

  ‘That’s torn it’ he said. ‘THEY know. We’ve got to go.’

  ‘Next time the light comes?’