Venom

by Alan Scholefield

  But she supposed she was lucky. He did not make too many demands on her and when he did she enjoyed them. Admit it. She quite liked the cold clinical approach.

  Thinking about it brought a hardening of her breasts and nipples and an unfamiliar warmth on the surface of her skin. “Could I have another glass,” she said to the stewardess, but the girl said they were crossing the Alps and that there would be turbulence and just then the sign came on telling everyone to fasten their seat-belts. Ten minutes later they had been told that Vienna was closed because of fog and they were turning back to Paris.

  Le Bourget was wet and cold under the orange lights but she was glad to get out of the plane. She had managed not to be sick but the effort had cost her a great deal and her face was wan. As soon as the passengers had been brought into the transit lounge she had hurried off to the wash-room and sponged away the sweat that had dried coldly on her forehead, then she had redone her face, and, feeling somewhat better, returned to the lounge.

  She took a cup of coffee to a deep armchair and sat sipping and smoking. When she finished she found that all her fellow passengers were lying on sofas or sprawling in chairs and she kicked off her shoes and closed her eyes. But the caffeine in the coffee kept her nervously awake. The romantic vision of Vienna by night was replaced by sudden vivid images of Philip: Philip in bed in Rome with ‘flu, Philip in bed in London with asthma, Philip as a baby in his cot with streaming nose and eyes; always Philip in bed. It seemed that he had been in and out of a sick-bed from the start of his life. But that was not really so and she knew it. It had begun one ice-bound day in the Catskills when he was almost four years old. She remembered it clearly. She and Pete had only had the motel a couple of years and things were just beginning to break even–you can’t take a derelict motel and hope to make a killing in your first year. It took time and hard work, and they had to put in a lot of both.

  It was January and Philip had been going to a play-group three miles down the highway at the home of a neighbour. Normally she picked him up about twelve-thirty, but on that particular day Pete had to go into Roxbury to the dentist and he had offered to fetch Philip up on the way back. It had been bitter weather with heavy snow the night before. The day was clear and very cold.

  One o’clock came, then two, without any sign of the car. At two-fifteen, as she was about to telephone the police, a patrol car arrived. There had been an accident. Would she come?

  It was worse than anything she could have imagined. The car had come off a bend on a patch of black ice, plunged down a slope and hit a tree where it came to rest. Her husband was standing near the wreck. Dried blood had crusted his cheeks from minor cuts on his forehead but otherwise he was unhurt. He was shaking and crying and hardly recognized her. But her child was still in the car and they were waiting for a mobile crane and oxy-acetylene cutters. It was the waiting, the fact that no one seemed to be doing anything that got to her and in her memory she could hear her voice screaming, “Help him! Why doesn’t someone help him!”

  By the time they cut Philip free he was almost frozen. It was a wonder, everyone said, that he had survived at all. From that moment, Ruth had made a pact with herself, that except for unavoidable circumstances she would never leave Philip to the responsibility of others–and that included her husband.

  No marriage could survive that, for Pete had soon learned she no longer trusted him with his own son. The marriage collapsed. The motel was sold at a loss. After the divorce she had taken a job as receptionist in a New York hotel. It was there she met Michel. He had been in the States looking for franchises. He had stayed a month, taken her out to dinner four times and asked her to marry him. A fortnight later she and Philip were in London. The nightmare had turned into a wonderful dream.

  As she sat in the transit lounge at Le Bourget, becoming more and more enmeshed in memories and anxiety, her ears caught the first announcement of an Air France departure to London and on impulse she checked to see whether there was a vacant seat. In half an hour she was airborne again, travelling back the way she had come. On the plane she had told herself that what she was doing was the most sensible of all the possible alternatives, for if Schwechat was closed to air traffic from London it would also be closed to aircraft from Singapore and since Michel’s flight was due in an hour later than her own it followed that he, too, would be unable to land and might go on anywhere–might even go to London. She had telephoned Sacher’s from Le Bourget and left a message for him, and Air France had telexed Schwechat for her and left a message there; so now she was going home to her own bed. Home. There was a twinge of disquiet in the word. She had also telephoned the house from Paris and had received an out-of-order tone. But she had told herself that she was phoning from another country and anything could happen to spoil a connection. Living in London she had become inured to bad lines, disconnections, calls that in the words of the Post Office “failed to mature”, engaged signals before she had finished dialling, out-of-order signals when she knew the telephone was working, in short all the frustrations that telephone users were heir to. But still . . . she didn’t like it. What if something had gone wrong and there was an imperative need to get through? But nothing had gone wrong. Well, nothing big anyway, except her whole day and half the night. Here she was flying and flying and never getting anywhere except the place she’d left. Hours of wasted time and effort. She was so tired and frustrated, she felt like crying.

  The old woman finally stopped feeding the pay phone and Ruth was able to dial the house. Again she received the out-of-order tone. She stood there feeling the frustration build up inside her. She dialled again. And again. Should she get on to “Faults”? Her will cringed at the thought of all the explaining, all the passing from one section to another she would have to endure. She slammed down the receiver and hurried in the direction of the main doors. The porter was waiting with a taxi. She tipped him less than normal and returned his glare with enough venom to make him flinch, then she was being swept along towards the tunnel and the motorway into London. She noticed that the taxi’s meter was not working and knew the driver would try to hit her for ten or fifteen pounds, perhaps even more after hearing her American accent. In a grim way she looked forward to the end of the journey.

  But soon her thoughts came back to the house. Why was the phone giving the out-of-order tone? Of course it could be a crossed line somewhere. Or snow. Wasn’t there supposed to be snow somewhere? Not in London though. Or the receiver might have been left off the hook. But that would have caused an engaged signal. She sat staring at her reflection in the window, seeing two dark holes for eyes and a downward slash of mouth.

  Part V

  Saturday 2.45 a.m-5.38 a.m.

  The atmosphere in the house had changed, Marion thought, since she had been brought in. Before that Bulloch had been in charge, big, aggressive, dominating the situation, but now Jacmel had taken over. She sat on the sofa with the boy’s sleeping weight on her lap and watched Jacmel and Dave at the windows. They, in turn, watched Bulloch shamble back to the cars.

  “What about a drink?” Dave said.

  “You think we can celebrate now?” Jacmel asked.

  “Why bloody not? You heard him. They’re getting the money.”

  “Easy? Just like that?” He snapped his fingers.

  “You were right, mate. We’ve got the boy. And now the woman. That’s what counts.”

  Success had brought not only euphoria into Dave’s tone but a respect for Jacmel as well. He’s like a little child, Marion thought, getting his own way. What would his reaction be if things went wrong? Rage? Panic? Fright? Probably a mixture of all three with a behaviour pattern no one could anticipate. And he had a shotgun in his hands.

  “Now we must think,” Jacmel said.

  “Think?”

  “My friend, no one is going to give us money and let us go without. . . how do you say it? . . . strings.”

  “Strings?”

  “Ask yourself.” Marion could hear the
patience in his voice; he’s humouring him, she thought. “Ask yourself. You have killed a pol . . .”

  “We. We, mate. That’s the law here. Conspiracy, they call it. You’re as much to blame as me.”

  “All right. As you say. A policeman has died. Right? So . . . they are just going to give us money and let us go?”

  “What can they do? You’re the one who says that if we’ve got the boy they can’t touch us.”

  “I do not know what they can do. I am not a policeman but I know if I was a policeman I would do something. No one can get us while we stay here in this house. But eventually we will give up. They know that. We know that. It is inevitable. But in a place of our own, where we are not besieged, where no one knows us. Where we can even get out for a while. That, my friend, is different. They know that, too. They are not fools, and it was you who told me that.”

  “So what do we do?” The euphoria had gone and in its place Marion heard uncertainty.

  “It is now that we must be most careful. When the tiger smiles it is not amusing. That is your English saying, no? There are only two doors are there not, the front door and the door below it from the cellar?”

  “That’s all.”

  “And at the back?”

  “I told you. A mews.”

  “A couturier, not so?”

  “Cou–?”

  “They make dresses.”

  “Oh, yes. A dressmaker.”

  Jacmel began to pace up and down the room. At last he said, “Go down. Check it. See that there is no other way in or out.”

  “I told you. Blank walls, that’s all.”

  “There may be a window.”

  “I’m not going, mate. That bloody snake could be anywhere. I’m not setting foot outside this room till we go.”

  “Don’t you understand,” Jacmel said patiently. “We have no freedom here. We cannot manoeuvre. We must make safe areas where we know the–”

  “That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? You want me to look for the bloody snake. The hell with that, mate. I did what you wanted with the knife but–”

  “Dave, listen to me.” His voice had dropped again and Marion began to realize how clever Jacmel was. He knew what sort of person he had for a partner and knew just how far he could push him. One moment he was firm with him. The next soft. One moment he held out safety; the next danger. It was the carrot and the stick. Now he went on to repeat his arguments about the house being a trap, about the shot policeman, about the lack of manoeuverability, about the possibility that there was another way into the house, but equally and more importantly that there might be another way out. It was this he had saved until last and it was this that seemed to reach Dave.

  “Not by yourself,” Jacmel said. “Take him. He will go first. And you have the gun. What can happen to you?”

  For some minutes past Howard had been sitting with his head thrown back on the cushions. Now Marion saw it snap upright. He’s terrified, she thought. And who could blame him? He had already done it once, in this room. Had cleared it for them. Searched it. Made it safe. By himself. No protective clothing. No gun. Now they were asking him again. It was too much to ask of anyone, she thought angrily. And then suddenly she had the answer. She couldn’t think why it had not occurred to her before, unless it was because she’d had a hell of a lot of other things to think about since she had looked down into Jacmel’s face on the steps of the house.

  “You don’t have to search for the snake,” she said and her voice dropped into the silence like glass splintering.

  Jacmel turned and strode back towards her, to stand over the sofa, square, dark-grey in the sombre light.

  “What do you say?”

  “You don’t have to endanger anyone,” she said. “If you turn off the heating you’ll be safe.”

  “What?”

  “The central heating. Turn it off and open the windows. The snake won’t bother you then. They can’t stand cold. It’ll go into a sort of coma and then die.”

  “Is it true?”

  She nodded wearily. “Yes, it’s true.”

  Jacmel turned to Howard. “What do you say?”

  “They’re cold-blooded,” he said, grasping at the relief. “That’s why they don’t come out in winter. Snakes can’t stand cold.”

  He stood over them, poised; then suddenly he made up his mind. “Where is the control?”

  “Just outside the door.”

  “Turn it off.”

  Howard went into the passage. The main thermostat which controlled the whole house was set into the wall near Philip’s room. It was set at seventy-five degrees and he turned it to the “Off” position. Somewhere in the depths of the house a pulse, too faint for anyone to feel, had been beating, now it stopped and the fans which blew the hot air through the ducts spun freely on their shafts growing slower and slower until they finally came to rest; in the cellar there was only the ticking of hot metal as the boiler began to cool.

  Upstairs Jacmel ordered Howard to go from room to room opening windows. Soon cold air was rushing into the house, flowing first over the carpets then rising up the walls like floodwater until whole rooms were filled with cold air and the walls themselves began to lose their heat. Fifteen minutes after the heating had been switched off and the first floor windows opened, the temperature in the drawing-room, where the largest windows of the house were situated, had plunged from between seventy and eighty degrees Farenheit to less than fifty. Marion felt the freezing air whirl around her feet and rise up her calves and shivered. She had taken off her heavy coat and now she tried to put her arms through the sleeves as gently as possible so as not to shift the child. The operation took some minutes and she was chilled by the time she pulled the coat around herself. She put her hand on Philip’s forehead and it was icy. Then she noticed that the pattern of his breathing had changed, he had begun to suck at the air as though he had difficulty in getting enough into his lungs.

  “We’ll have to close the windows again,” she said to Jacmel.

  “We have just opened them.”

  “It’s the boy. His breathing’s getting worse.”

  Dave had poured himself a whisky and was sipping it. “You must be kidding,” he said.

  She ignored him, addressing Jacmel. “If he gets really ill he’ll complicate things for you.”

  “And if he dies,” Howard said brutally, “you’ll have another body. Bodies can’t be explained away. What’ll you do? Throw him in the Thames?”

  “Shut up!” It was the first time they had seen Jacmel really angry, but when he spoke again he was in control of himself. “You,” he said softly to Howard, “you must take great care.”

  “Why? My value to you is nil. D’you think I don’t know what’s going to happen?”

  “Why would they harm you?” Marion said. “The money is coming.”

  It was time she knew, he thought, yet something held him back from spelling it out; perhaps he did not want to hear it himself. “You don’t think they’re going to take the money and leave us here having breakfast, do you?”

  “But you said–”

  “I said you’d be all right. You probably will be.”

  “Then–” Philip moaned and turned in her lap. She felt him again. “He’s freezing! For God’s sake!”

  “Get a blanket,” Jacmel said to Howard.

  “Why not let him go to his room?” Howard said. “It could be a couple of hours before they get the money together. Marks, francs, pounds . . . it’s not that easy. There’s an electric heater in his room. At least he’ll be warm.”

  Jacmel hesitated. Dave said, “Keep him here where we can see him. Doesn’t matter if the little bastard does catch cold.” “Louise said he had asthma.”

  “So what?” Dave said.

  “He’s not going to wake up for hours,” Howard said. “Not after a double dose. His windows are locked. Lock his door too if you like. But believe me, if you don’t, you’re going to have a very sick child on your hand
s.”

  Jacmel nodded. “All right. But first you . . .”

  “I know,” Howard said. “I know.”

  He moved towards the fireplace and pointed to the long brass poker. Jacmel nodded again and then said to Dave, “Go with him. It is time to earn your money.” This was not the friendly tone of camaraderie but that of an officer to a ranker.

  Marion watched as Howard moved towards the door. There was sweat on his face in spite of the cold. She wanted to say something to help but could think of nothing. She told herself that Dave had a shotgun; the moment they saw the faintest shadow of a snake he would kill it. She sat holding the boy very tightly.

  The boy’s room was where Louise had been bitten–more accurately the dressing-room or, as Phil had named it, the Great Ngorongoro Crater Menagerie. Howard’s legs were feeling weak again; he had tried to walk with a straight back from the sitting-room because of Marion Stowe. He did not want her to see how afraid he really was. He told himself that if she knew she might become hysterical and that would complicate things still further, but that was only partially true.