Dark Room

by Tom Becker

  “I screamed again,” Patti continued. “Actually, I’m not sure I had stopped screaming. But Amy was so calm. She just walked over and hugged me and told me everything would be all right, she would take care of it. I ran from that basement faster than I had ever moved before, never looked back once, never told a soul what had happened. Maybe if I had, things would be different now.”

  “You shouldn’t blame yourself,” Darla said fiercely. “Walter was the killer, not you. You were just defending yourself.”

  Patti gave her an anguished look. “But that’s just it, don’t you see?” she said, her voice echoing around the creek. “At the time I was sure I had killed him, yet then word got out that Walter had hanged himself. For weeks I waited for the police to come and question me, barely slept a wink the whole time. But eventually I figured the Wests just wanted the whole thing wrapped up as quickly as possible – Walter was dead, what was the use in bringing another victim into it? Then one day, years later, I received a letter. From Amy. I hadn’t seen her since that day in the basement. She’d gone to all kinds of trouble to find me. I guess there were some things she had to get off her chest.

  “It turned out I had bashed Walter pretty good, but all I’d done was knock him out. When Allan West came home Amy told him what had happened. But even after everything, her father couldn’t bring himself to turn his son in. Instead he gave him a bundle of cash and helped him get across the Mexican border. When Crystal’s body was found in the creek, Allan said that Walter had hanged himself. He was so powerful in this town, he could do whatever he wanted – if that meant persuading the police to call off the investigation, or carrying out a staged funeral, then so be it. At the time I remember Crystal’s brother causing a ruckus at Walter’s funeral, but Leeroy had such a bad reputation no one paid him any mind. All the while, according to Amy, Walter carried on down into South America. That was the last she heard about him. She didn’t really want to know, she felt so guilty. Like it was her fault for what her brother had done.”

  “And now Walter’s come back,” Darla said solemnly.

  Patti nodded, tears glimmering in her eyes. “Why else are young, beautiful people dying? If only I’d have said something at the time, Walter wouldn’t have felt it was safe to come back. But you have to understand, I thought I had killed someone, and then I started getting phone calls from lawyers threatening to take me to court if I said anything about Walter West – for defamation of character, attempted murder, you name it. In the end it was Sasha’s father who stepped in to help me, that’s how I met him. I was so scared I didn’t know what to do with myself, and the doctor prescribed me some pills. But now people are being killed again and all these old memories are coming back. So I thought I’d come down to the creek; I used to come here all the time, when I was a little girl. Before…”

  “But if Walter’s returned, how come nobody’s seen him?”

  “It’s been twenty years,” replied Patti. “A lot can happen in that time. Who knows what he looks like now?”

  “Maybe you oughta try writing to Amy,” Darla suggested. “Walter’s a killer but she’s still his sister – maybe she’s heard from him.”

  Patti shook her head. “She said in her letter that she moved around a lot, and not to bother trying to keep in touch. Amy was in Arizona at the time, I think… No wait, I remember now, it was New Mexico. She said she had married a musician and they’d had a little girl together.”

  Darla’s mouth went dry. She stared at Patti. “Amy, you mean – Amy West?”

  “Yes, but she’d changed her name by then. To Sidney, if I remember rightly. Darla, are you all right?”

  It couldn’t be true. And yet… Suddenly Sidney’s flight from Saffron Hills made perfect sense. No wonder she had left with the first charming man who’d taken a shine to her. It explained her quiet acceptance of the tough life that followed – and the guilt that had found its end in a trailer bathtub.

  For a time neither of them spoke, both staring out over the creek. Then Patti shivered. “I’ve been daydreaming down here long enough,” she said. “Sasha’s father is away on business again, and I don’t want her coming home to an empty house. Do you need a ride home, Darla?”

  “Thanks, I’m OK,” Darla told her. “I live just down by the creek.”

  Sasha’s mom surprised her by reaching out and squeezing Darla, quickly and fiercely, before disappearing into the night. Darla stayed by the water’s edge for a while longer, trying to come to terms with what she had just learned. Her mom was a West, which made Darla one too. It also meant that her uncle was a brutal killer. Could that explain the visions she had seen? Slowly Darla continued on down the creek, aware that she was nearing the lane leading home. When she passed Annie’s house she saw that the windows were dark, the wind chimes playing a lonely lullaby in the breeze. She heard a voice calling out into the night, and the breath caught in her throat. But then Darla relaxed – it was the same cry for help she had heard the first time she had entered Annie’s yard. She crept through the bushes and stopped, entranced by the scene before her. The House of Narcissus had finally been finished. A ring of candles had been lit inside the small house, their orange flames dancing in their own reflections. The effect was strange and beautiful at the same time, and for the first time Darla sensed she understood why Annie had built it.

  All the time you’ve spent looking through the killer’s eyes, Sasha had said scornfully in the bleachers, and you never even got a glimpse of them. At the time Darla had thought her friend was just being spiteful, but as she stared at the House of Narcissus she began to wonder whether Sasha had been right. Could Darla have done more? Instead of trying to hide from her visions, should she have been trying to experience more of them – to spend more time inside the Angel Taker’s head, to try to learn anything that might reveal their identity? Maybe if she had tried, Frank would still be alive.

  An eerie calmness washed over Darla. She walked slowly across the yard and through the entrance into the House of Narcissus. A hundred haunted faces stared back at her, a soft voice continuing to call “Echo” through the speakers. Darla forced herself to keep looking, to stare deeper and deeper into her own reflection. It felt as though the building began to tremble, and then suddenly Darla was plunged into an icy well of nameless, unspeakable rage. A flurry of images assailed her: she was grabbing Crystal by the hair and throwing her across the studio; she was slyly circling Patti, a knife in her hand; she was slitting and cutting and slicing through Perfect flesh; she was dragging Frank’s bloodied carcass across the floor. And then suddenly Darla was somewhere else, stalking through a deserted corridor towards a doorway edged with red light. It looked like the entrance to hell itself. Darla pushed open the door, and felt her face being bathed in red light as she stared down a narrow flight of stairs.

  Her dizzying vision ended with a jolt, and Darla went stumbling out of the House of Narcissus as though the building had spat her out. But she knew exactly what she had to do. Leaving the house of mirrors and its chorus of echoes behind her, she ran through the thick shadows of the creek lane back to her house and unlocked the front door. Hopper still hadn’t come home – probably still drowning his sorrows in Shooters. Darla went over to the fridge and freed the piece of paper with Annie’s cell number from the magnet. She went over to the house phone and dialled the number, praying that the artist would pick up.

  “Hello?”

  “Annie?” said Darla. “Where are you? I need your help.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  It was blacker than a snake’s mouth beyond the gates of Tall Pines, the driveway a cracked tarmac tongue. Trees swayed woozily in the wind. Darla peered through the windshield of Annie’s car into the darkness, searching in vain for a glimpse of the West mansion.

  “I’m not sure about this, hon.”

  Annie had been working late at the gallery when Darla had called, and had driven straight over. Darla had been expecting her to have all sorts of questions, especiall
y when she had told her she needed a ride up into the hills. Annie had taken one look at her face and simply nodded. But now her tone was dubious.

  “I’ll be OK,” Darla told her.

  “I don’t think you should be creeping round houses in the middle of the night – it’s not safe. Maybe we should call Hopper.”

  “No.” Darla’s voice was quiet but firm. “Wherever he is, he don’t want to be bothered.”

  “Then why don’t you tell me what all this is about?”

  Darla hesitated. She didn’t want to lie to Annie but she knew that if she told the artist the truth – that the Angel Taker was lurking somewhere inside Tall Pines – Annie would try to stop her from going inside. And Darla had to go inside. She had to end this now.

  “Darla?”

  She slipped off her seatbelt and opened the car door before the artist could stop her.

  “Hey, wait!” Annie called out. “Where are you going, hon?”

  Darla didn’t look back, sprinting away from the car and through the gates into Tall Pines. The breeze funnelled through the trees, rustling leaves and prickling the bare flesh on her arms. She followed the sinuous path of the driveway as it snaked to the left, Tall Pines slowly rising up out of the darkness in front of her. The night had masked the mansion’s rotten and rusted façade, and suddenly Darla could imagine how Patti Haas must have felt when she walked up the driveway twenty years earlier, carrying Walter West’s assignment in her schoolbag. Now, as Darla melted into Tall Pines’ imposing silhouette, she spotted a car parked under the trees. She slowed, her heart thundering in her chest.

  It was Hopper’s Buick.

  Darla hurried over to the car and peered in through the window. The seats were empty, the keys still in the ignition. Why had her daddy left the bar and driven all the way here? As far as Darla knew, Hopper hadn’t even heard about Tall Pines. She felt sick with unease.

  Footsteps. Darla looked up, startled, to see Annie marching down the driveway towards her.

  “What on earth do you think you’re playing at, running off like that?” she scolded. “I was—”

  She stopped at the sight of the Buick.

  “That’s Hopper’s car,” said Annie. “Darla, what in hell’s going on here?”

  “I don’t know,” Darla said apprehensively. “But I think Hopper and the Angel Taker are inside Tall Pines.”

  “I think we’d better call the cops.”

  “There’s no time!” Darla pleaded with her. “It’s my daddy, Annie. If he’s in trouble I have to help him.”

  A determined look settled on Annie’s face. “Then I guess we’d better go in together,” she said.

  Darla hurried up the crumbling verandah steps before Annie could change her mind. Tall Pines swallowed her up with a cold gust of air. The corridors and rooms were pitch-black, the air thick with mould. Darla went noiselessly along, her eyes straining for any sign of movement ahead of her. A creature scuttled across her path, and she had to bite back a scream. She was suddenly incredibly grateful that Annie was with her, a pensive, reassuring presence at her side.

  Soft light was spilling out through the doorway at the end of the corridor. Darla peered around the corner. She stared into the dining room where she had sat with Frank and Sasha the day of Natalie’s funeral. Someone had been hard at work here. A single place had been set at the head of the table, a bone china plate accompanied by silver cutlery and an empty crystal wineglass. Candles flickered and wavered, picking out an old-fashioned camera and a photograph album placed carefully on the mahogany surface.

  “Looks like someone was expecting dinner tonight,” Annie murmured. When she came to the place setting she reached out for the photograph album.

  “Wait!” hissed Darla. “Don’t—”

  Too late. Annie opened the album.

  “Oh my Lord,” she whispered.

  Slowly she turned one page after another. All the killer’s victims were there, their final moments captured in black-and-white photographs: Natalie, Ryan, TJ, Carmen… and last and most horribly of all, Frank, sprawled out across the library floor, his hands held up to the camera in a futile defensive gesture. Darla wished that Annie would close the album but the artist seemed lost in the photographs, lingering on each page.

  “This is… I don’t know what to say,” she murmured. “Horrible. And kinda mesmerizing at the same time.”

  “Annie, put it back!” pleaded Darla.

  She turned to go, only for the artist to call her back.

  “What is it?”

  Annie looked from the album. “There’s another photo here.”

  She passed the album to Darla. As she stared at the new photograph, Darla went cold. It was a lurching close-up of Sasha Haas’s face as she screamed into the lens. Darla slammed the album shut.

  Click.

  She looked up, startled. Annie had picked up the camera and was training the lens upon her.

  “That’s perfect, honey,” the artist said. “Hold that thought.”

  Darla stared at her. “What are you doing?”

  “What does it look like? I’m taking your photograph.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m an artist, aren’t I?”

  “Annie, now really isn’t the time.”

  “I disagree, hon. I believe now is precisely the time.”

  Click.

  Darla backed away slowly. “I mean it, Annie,” she said. “You’re scaring me.”

  The artist put the camera down, a smile playing on her lips. “There’s nothing to be scared of, Darla.”

  “What about the Angel Taker?”

  “They’re not going to want you, are they now hon? With your plain little freckle face and scrawny body. What kind of angel would you make?”

  Darla tried to run, but Annie’s hand darted out like a snake and fastened around her wrist. Grabbing a fistful of her hair with her other hand, Annie marched the squirming Darla out of the dining room and along the corridor.

  “Let go!” cried Darla. “You’re hurting me!”

  She winced as Annie tightened her grip. The artist was surprisingly strong, and Darla had a sudden flashback to their first meeting, and the ease with which she had hauled the heavy mirror for her House of Narcissus. As they approached the basement door beneath the stairs, Darla saw a faint red glow shining out from behind it. She tried to fight but Annie was too strong. The artist pushed Darla through the door, sending her stumbling down the narrow steps.

  Straight into a nightmare.

  The basement had been turned into the dark room of her visions, red light bulbs bathing the room in crimson. Photographs floated in shallow trays of developing fluid on the desk. The beautiful landscapes had been taken down from the walls, replaced by portraits of blue-tinged corpses. A space had been cleared in the middle of the room, where Sasha was tied up in a chair. Her head was bowed, her peroxide fringe hanging down over her face. Glistening red marks punctured her white tank top. She was sitting horribly still.

  When Darla tried to run to her friend, Annie viciously pulled her back.

  “Ah ah,” she tutted. “Don’t touch the exhibits.”

  “Why are you doing this?” Darla sobbed. “I thought you were my friend!”

  “I’m disappointed in you, Darla,” Annie replied. “Didn’t I tell you that I was working on a new artwork? But it wasn’t in my backyard. Saffron Hills is my canvas, and I’ve been painting red all over it.”

  “It was you who left the lilies on Walter’s grave, wasn’t it?”

  Annie smiled.

  “But it don’t make no sense – I know he didn’t hang himself, it was all a cover-up so he could go to South America. It’s Walter who’s been killing everyone – he’s the Angel Taker!”

  Annie gazed at her steadily. “Walter West died in Brazil fifteen years ago,” she said. “I killed him.”

  Darla’s throat was so dry it was hard to swallow. “What?”

  “You see, Walter couldn’t stand being away from
Saffron Hills. This town is just filled with angels and pretty young things, and Walter loved pretty things. But he knew that he couldn’t come back any more, not after what happened with Crystal and Patti. Not after he had been … interrupted. So when he arrived in Brazil he let someone turn their knife on him. A surgeon, who cut and sliced Walter everywhere, until he was a completely different person.” Annie smiled. “A whole new woman, in fact.”

  The floor seemed to tilt and shake beneath Darla. She was dizzy with disbelief.

  “You’re Walter West?” she said faintly.

  “My name is Annie Taylor,” she shot back, through clenched teeth. “I told you, there is no Walter West any more. I killed him. I scribbled him out. I erased his every last trace.”

  Like the self-portraits in the gallery, and the whited-out photograph of Walter in the yearbook. Darla could never have believed it was possible. It wasn’t just that Annie had once been a man – although that was shocking enough. It was that the kindly artist, the woman who had talked to Darla and hugged and comforted her like no one had since her mom had died, had been a cold-blooded killer.

  Was still a cold-blooded killer, Darla reminded herself.

  “It’s fitting, don’t you think?” said Annie. “I turned myself into an angel of my very own – an angel of death. With my hunting knife and my camera I killed time and time again, first in Brazil and then in New York. I made albums filled with the most beautiful photographs. Only then did I feel ready to come home. I took a job at the school so I could select my angels. Everything was set. And then you washed up into town.”

  “You knew about Hopper and me from the start, didn’t you?”

  “Of course I did,” Annie replied contemptuously. “My sister could call herself any name she liked, but she was still a West. My father had private detectives combing the state for her within hours of her leaving Saffron Hills. He knew all about Hopper the musician and his little Darla. And then there you were, in my backyard. I saw how far my sister had fallen – a drunken loser for a husband, and a helpless mouse for a child – no wonder she killed herself. It was so typical of Amy, she was always so weak.”