The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 2002, Volume 13

by Stephen Jones

  Janie stared at her feet. He took a step toward her, the fragrance of oak-mast and honey filling her nostrils, crushed acorns, new fern. She grew dizzy, her hand lifting to find him; but he only reached to graze her cheek with his finger.

  ‘Night then, Janie,’ he said softly, and walked back out into the misty evening.

  When he was gone she raced to the windows and pulled all the velvet curtains, then tore the wig from her head and threw it onto the couch along with her glasses. Her heart was pounding, her face slick with sweat – from fear or rage or disappointment, she didn’t know. She yanked off her sweater and jeans, left them on the living-room floor and stomped into the bathroom. She stood in the shower for twenty minutes, head upturned as the water sluiced the smells of bracken and leaf-mold from her skin.

  Finally she got out. She dried herself, let the towel drop and went into the kitchen. Abruptly she was famished. She tore open cupboards and drawers until she found a half-full jar of lavender honey from Provence. She opened it, the top spinning off into the sink, and frantically spooned honey into her mouth with her fingers. When she was finished she grabbed a jar of lemon curd and ate most of that, until she felt as though she might be sick. She stuck her head into the sink, letting water run from the faucet into her mouth, and at last walked, surfeited, into the bedroom.

  She dressed, feeling warm and drowsy, almost dreamlike; pulling on red-and-yellow striped stockings, her nylon skirt, a tight red T-shirt. No bra, no panties. She put in her contacts, then examined herself in the mirror. Her hair had begun to grow back, a scant velvety stubble, bluish in the dim light. She drew a sweeping black line across each eyelid, on a whim took the liner and extended the curve of each antennae until they touched her temples. She painted her lips black as well and went to find her black vinyl raincoat.

  It was early when she went out, far too early for any of the clubs to be open. The rain had stopped, but a thick greasy fog hung over everything, coating windshields and shop windows, making Janie’s face feel as though it were encased in a clammy shell. For hours she wandered Camden Town, huge violet eyes turning to stare back at the men who watched her, dismissing each of them. Once she thought she saw David Bierce, coming out of Ruby in the Dust; but when she stopped to watch him cross the street saw it was not David at all but someone else. Much younger, his long dark hair in a thick braid, his feet clad in knee-high boots. He crossed the High Street, heading towards the Tube station. Janie hesitated, then darted after him.

  He went to the Electric Ballroom. Fifteen or so people stood out front, talking quietly. The man she’d followed joined the line, standing by himself. Janie waited across the street, until the door opened and the little crowd began to shuffle inside. After the long-haired young man had entered she counted to one hundred, crossed the street, paid her cover and went inside.

  The club had three levels; she finally tracked him down on the uppermost one. Even on a rainy Wednesday night it was crowded, the sound system blaring Idris Mohammed and Jimmie Cliff. He was standing alone near the bar, drinking bottled water.

  ‘Hi!’ she shouted, swaying up to him with her best First Day of School smile. ‘Want to dance?’

  He was older than she’d thought – thirtyish, still not as old as Bierce. He stared at her, puzzled, then shrugged. ‘Sure.’

  They danced, passing the water bottle between them. ‘What’s your name?’ he shouted.

  ‘Cleopatra Brimstone.’

  ‘You’re kidding!’ he yelled back. The song ended in a bleat of feedback, and they walked, panting, back to the bar.

  ‘What, you know another Cleopatra?’ Janie asked teasingly.

  ‘No. It’s just a crazy name, that’s all.’ He smiled. He was handsomer than David Bierce, his features softer, more rounded, his eyes dark brown, his manner a bit reticent. ‘I’m Thomas Raybourne. Tom.’

  He bought another bottle of Pellegrino and one for Janie. She drank it quickly, trying to get his measure. When she finished she set the empty bottle on the floor and fanned herself with her hand.

  ‘It’s hot in here.’ Her throat hurt from shouting over the music. ‘I think I’m going to take a walk. Feel like coming?’

  He hesitated, glancing around the club. ‘I was supposed to meet a friend here . . .’ he began, frowning. ‘But—’

  ‘Oh.’ Disappointment filled her, spiking into desperation. ‘Well, that’s okay. I guess.’

  ‘Oh, what the hell.’ He smiled: he had nice eyes, a more stolid, reassuring gaze than Bierce. ‘I can always come back.’

  Outside she turned right, in the direction of the canal. ‘I live pretty close by. Feel like coming in for a drink?’

  He shrugged again. ‘I don’t drink, actually.’

  ‘Something to eat then? It’s not far – just along the canal path, a few blocks past Camden Lock—’

  ‘Yeah, sure.’

  They made desultory conversation. ‘You should be careful,’ he said as they crossed the bridge. ‘Did you read about those people who’ve gone missing in Camden Town?’

  Janie nodded but said nothing. She felt anxious and clumsy – as though she’d drunk too much, although she’d had nothing since the two glasses of wine with David Bierce. Her companion also seemed ill at ease; he kept glancing back, as though looking for someone on the canal path behind them.

  ‘I should have tried to call,’ he explained ruefully. ‘But I forgot to recharge my mobile.’

  ‘You could call from my place.’

  ‘No, that’s all right.’

  She could tell from his tone that he was figuring how he could leave, gracefully, as soon as possible.

  Inside the flat he settled on the couch, picked up a copy of Time Out and flipped through it, pretending to read. Janie went immediately into the kitchen and poured herself a glass of brandy. She downed it, poured a second one, and joined him on the couch.

  ‘So.’ She kicked off her Doc Martens, drew her stockinged foot slowly up his leg, from calf to thigh. ‘Where you from?’

  He was passive, so passive she wondered if he would get aroused at all. But after a while they were lying on the couch, both their shirts on the floor, his pants unzipped and his cock stiff, pressing against her bare belly.

  ‘Let’s go in there,’ Janie whispered hoarsely. She took his hand and led him into the bedroom.

  She only bothered lighting a single candle, before lying beside him on the bed. His eyes were half-closed, his breathing shallow. When she ran a fingernail around one nipple he made a small surprised sound, then quickly turned and pinned her to the bed.

  ‘Wait! Slow down,’ Janie said, and wriggled from beneath him. For the last week she’d left the bonds attached to the bedposts, hiding them beneath the covers when not in use. Now she grabbed one of the wristcuffs and pulled it free. Before he could see what she was doing it was around his wrist.

  ‘Hey!’

  She dived for the foot of the bed, his leg narrowly missing her as it thrashed against the covers. It was more difficult to get this in place, but she made a great show of giggling and stroking his thigh, which seemed to calm him. The other leg was next, and finally she leapt from the bed and darted to the headboard, slipping from his grasp when he tried to grab her shoulder.

  ‘This is not consensual,’ he said. She couldn’t tell if he was serious or not.

  ‘What about this, then?’ she murmured, sliding down between his legs and cupping his erect penis between her hands. ‘This seems to be enjoying itself.’

  He groaned softly, shutting his eyes. ‘Try to get away,’ she said. ‘Try to get away.’

  He tried to lunge upward, his body arching so violently that she drew back in alarm. The bonds held; he arched again, and again, but now she remained beside him, her hands on his cock, his breath coming faster and faster and her own breath keeping pace with it, her heart pounding and the tingling above her eyes almost unbearable.

  ‘Try to get away,’ she gasped. ‘Try to get away—’

  When h
e came he cried out, his voice harsh, as though in pain, and Janie cried out as well, squeezing her eyes shut as spasms shook her from head to groin. Quickly her head dipped to kiss his chest; then she shuddered and drew back, watching.

  His voice rose again, ended suddenly in a shrill wail, as his limbs knotted and shriveled like burning rope. She had a final glimpse of him, a homunculus sprouting too many legs. Then on the bed before her a perfectly formed Papilio krischna swallowtail crawled across the rumpled duvet, its wings twitching to display glittering green scales amidst spectral washes of violet and crimson and gold.

  ‘Oh, you’re beautiful, beautiful,’ she whispered.

  From across the room echoed a sound: soft, the rustle of her kimono falling from its hook as the door swung open. She snatched her hand from the butterfly and stared, through the door to the living room.

  In her haste to get Thomas Raybourne inside she had forgotten to latch the front door. She scrambled to her feet, naked, staring wildly at the shadow looming in front of her, its features taking shape as it approached the candle, brown and black, light glinting across his face.

  It was David Bierce. The scent of oak and bracken swelled, suffocating, fragrant, cut by the bitter odor of ethyl alcohol. He forced her gently onto the bed, heat piercing her breast and thighs, her antenna bursting out like quills from her brow and wings exploding everywhere around her as she struggled fruitlessly.

  ‘Now. Try to get away,’ he said.

  CHICO KIDD

  Cats and Architecture

  CHICO KIDD’S DAY JOB IS IN ADVERTISING, for which she has won several awards, all, oddly enough, in the field of publishing.

  Her first novel, The Printer’s Devil, appeared in 1995 from Baen Books (under the name of Chico Kidd rather than A.F.), while almost all her short stories were finally collected together in one volume by Ash-Tree Press in Summoning Knells and Other Inventions (2000). She also writes stories in collaboration with Rick Kennett in Australia featuring William Hope Hodgson’s character, Carnacki the Ghost-Finder. The Ghost Story Society published a collection of four stories in 1992, and this has been substantially expanded for the recent Ash-Tree collection, Number 472 Cheyne Walk.

  ‘You could call “Cats and Architecture” a transitional tale between the old (and rather old-fashioned) “A.F.” stories and the present series,’ Kidd reveals. ‘You could also call it an epiphany. Or a revelation. I suffered from writer’s block for more than five years. It is a terrible affliction. This story started out as a typically Jamesian piece, and I’d been struggling with it for a long time. And then Captain Da Silva appeared, with a past and a personality and a lot of baggage I wasn’t conscious of inventing. And since then I’ve been writing as if a dam has burst.

  ‘One odd thing: the “proverb” quoted at the start of part two apparently isn’t, at least my Portuguese friend has never heard it. Yet I must have found it somewhere as it was in my commonplace book (no source quoted). It wasn’t until I was halfway through the third novel, earlier this year, that I discovered it was a saying of the Captain’s mother.’

  I

  It was not carnival time in Venice, yet strangely enough a kind of charivari spirit seemed still to move along the city’s narrow byways. Round the corner ahead you might hear the ghost of a laugh or a whisper of music, only to have it dissipate as you approached, or mutate into the soft plash of canal waters.

  That the city is given to shades, and cannot escape its aura of being a place where time seems thin and stretched, is not a reason for the existence of such phantasms, any more than the human body is the cause or creator of its own internal organs—

  Jo Da Silva put down her pen, her mind stuck in the groove of the movie Don’t Look Now, and walked over to the window.

  Out of season, Venice had indeed slipped back into the past that it inhabited after the majority of the tourists had departed, and had become a village again. The stinks of high summer were gone as well, and a kind of comfortable melancholy imbued its misty vistas.

  The apartment looked out on a small, terracotta-coloured piazza (or campo, if you wanted to be pedantic about it). Its usual tenants were visiting relatives in Australia, and Jo was not one to turn down the offer of a month’s free accommodation in La Serenissima; although she had done precious little in the way of the writing she had intended to knuckle down to in the week she had spent there. Its only drawback was her suspicion that the building harboured rats in its nether regions.

  At the moment the campo appeared totally uninhabited, as if Jo were in a city on the moon, or perhaps in a de Chirico painting. It was almost completely filled up with shadows, and most of the windows in the other buildings that surrounded it were shuttered, like closed eyes. Potted plants made splashes of colour here and there.

  Despite the direction of her last thoughts, she was not really expecting to see sinister little red-coated figures. The campo was so sleepy, in fact, that she was not expecting to see anything at all, which was why a movement in her eye’s corner made her jump.

  Diagonally across the square, one shuttered window stood slightly ajar. The shutter, half open, folded in on itself, as it were, gave a glimpse of darkness behind; and something whitish fluttered there. Not a curtain, for it had solidity. Not a person, either – but why had she thought that?

  Ow, I seen it wive at me out the winder.

  More ghost stories in her mind! That was Oh Whistle and I’ll Come to You. On second thoughts, she rather wished that particular tale hadn’t come to the surface.

  . . . And I didn’t like it.

  Jo ran a hand though her short hair and decided it was definitely time to go and drink a cup of espresso, and possibly a glass of grappa as well. Or, even better, have a caffè corretto and combine the two – she liked the idea that coffee could be ‘corrected’ by the addition of alcohol. Besides, she had to go past the building with the window to get to the bar, and could take, therefore, a closer look.

  Out in the red-shadowed, deserted campo, her steps echoed hollowly. The shadows had put a chill into the square, although above her the sky was still a hazed blue, only just beginning to fade towards evening.

  A dog came sniffing out of an alley, busy on its own affairs, and Jo smiled; she liked dogs, but wished this one would do something to earn its keep, firstly by going after the rats and then, probably, doing something to deter the supercilious white cat that she had seen slinking around the vicinity most nights, like a pathfinder from the Countess of Groan’s entourage. In Jo’s opinion it was white cats that should be witches’ familiars, leaving their black counterparts to bring, like chimney sweepers, luck where they would; silent and sneaky as all felines, to Jo the ghostlike pallor of the whites was far more suited to a supernatural role. Darkness creeps on cat feet, she thought, deliberately misquoting, and smiled to herself.

  Now she was in the building’s shadow, she looked up. It was older – and grander – than she’d thought at first: almost a demi-palazzo, it could have dated from the eighteenth century, but Jo’s knowledge of architectural styles was sketchy at best. The window, on the top storey, was tall and possessed of a tiny balcony too small to sit on, but just wide enough for plant pots: indeed, others round the square were cluttered with flowers – the ubiquitous geraniums and petunias, whose hot pinks and reds clashed with the suntan-colours of the terracotta pots, and here and there a trail of magenta bougainvillea, like a Christmas paper chain.

  Beside the front door, where now she stood, she saw a single bell-push – apparently the building had escaped being converted into apartments. After a moment’s hesitation, she pressed it, hearing its dim buzz deep inside, like a trapped insect, but there was no reply.

  She was conscious, then, of being on a cusp, presented with a clear choice between two routes. Either she could forget a thing, or a nothing, seen out of the edge of her eye in a building kitty-corner to her life; or, like the egregious Franz Westen, go in pursuit of it.

  It brought a wry grin to her face. She
may have been suffering from writer’s block, but no one had ever accused her of lacking imagination, and nobody would ever say she was devoid of curiosity. And tending still towards feline metaphors, the significance of that was not lost on her.

  Between the campo and the bar she had claimed as her own she passed a shop that sold masks, fantastical things of pasteboard and feathers and sequins and enamel, like an Ensor dream. Its window was always brightly illuminated, so that the colours of the masks gleamed in the hard bright light like phantasmagorical beetle-cases.

  The Phantom of the Opera is here, inside your mind.

  Jo shook her head to rid it of the irritating tune, but all she could think of as a substitute on the spur of the moment was poor mad Lucia, fluting ‘Il fantasmo!’; and the famous shot of Joan Sutherland, wild-haired in her bloodstained nightie, floated behind her eyes.

  Reaching her destination, thoughts of corrected coffee drove out her introspection. Although the name Il Bar Roberto was written on the window in fading paint, the establishment was presided over by a tall thin unsmiling woman with an intimidating moustache; she was generally known as La Strega – although no cats, black, white or otherwise, were allowed past her door. Under her aegis a number of young women who were too much like her in appearance (although mostly lacking the facial hair) not to be her daughters bustled about, serving customers, ministering to the espresso machine, and gossiping at the tops of their voices. In one corner a television with the sound turned down always seemed to be showing a football match, and usually a number of men were clustered round it roaring encouragement, or otherwise.

  ‘Does anyone live in the house on the corner?’ Jo asked one of the daughters, who shrugged her shoulders and shook her head at the same time. An older sister, passing with a tray of dirty cups and glasses, was more knowledgeable.

  ‘It belonged to an old boy called Della Quercia,’ she told Jo. ‘He didn’t leave a will when he died; the children’s lawyers have been arguing over the house for years. So someone’s getting fat out of it. Why do you ask?’