by Walter, Adam
She pulled away and pinched the bridge of her nose.
“I’m sorry Ben.” She tried to laugh. “Too many bad dreams.” I took her arm and led her to the sofa. “Come on Abb, sit over here.”
I went back and drew the curtains. For a moment I looked over the cottage. Abby was an interior designer, a concept embraced by David in one of his never-ending searches for some form of fulfilment. Together they had gutted the 17th century cottage. Splattered with exclusive furniture, the cottage fell into two distinct camps: white, light rooms coupled with dark, moody ones.
They had even varnished the living room floorboards black. In the past the contrasts had been pleasing on the eye and soothing on the mind. Yet in present circumstances, all I could feel was a brooding, sombre restlessness.
Abby tucked her feet beneath her and toyed with her wineglass. I sat next to her.
“How long have you been like this?”
She shrugged. “Forever.”
“Don’t Abb. I’m trying to help.”
A sad smile curled her lips. “It was always you wasn’t it Ben? You were always there when I needed a friend.”
I nodded. Yes, I was always a friend. “You can’t go on like this Abb. Sooner or later...”
The turmoil of breakdown was implicit in my unspoken words, concepts I’d contemplated myself. Abby nodded not really listening. She sipped her wine. It was some Australian Shiraz - ‘spicy with cherry and plum flavours’. All I could taste was wine.
“How long was it after…”
“Caroline?” I pursed my lips. “It’s not really the same thing”
“Oh I don’t know Ben. Having someone walk out on you like that...”
“Years,” I said eventually. I waved my glass, almost spilling some of the contents on the leather sofa. “But you just have to get on with life.”
It seemed the right thing to say, but I didn’t believe it. Abby was watching me closely, the absorption of grief halted briefly as she latched onto mine.
“I’m sorry Ben, truly sorry. I just never thought.”
Half-heartedly I raised a hand. It didn’t matter.
“Is it still fresh – in your mind I mean?”
“No,” I said and meant it. Caroline and I had been together ten years. Then one day she just wasn’t there. She phoned once and told me not to look for her. There were no explanations and no goodbyes - just emptiness. And ever after I had been lost, searching for my place in the world - a place that justified my existence.
I shifted in my seat. “There is something though.” Abby’s sleepy eyes were wide now, eager to share the secrets of sorrow. “Sometimes,” I said, “it’s hard to see her face.” Abby frowned. “I remember others. People I’ve met maybe only once or twice, I can see them.” I took a deep breath. “But Caroline...” I shook my head and drained my glass.
There was silence between us. I reached for the bottle.
“I don’t have trouble remembering David,” said Abby. “I see him every day.”
My focus wavered. I looked at Abby. She wouldn’t meet my gaze, nor did she elaborate. Very carefully, I set the bottle down.
“You – see David?”
She smiled and turned to face me. “Don’t worry Ben, I’m not going mad or anything. But he’s,” she gestured helplessly, “around.” She nodded towards the window. “Out there I mean. He’s out there.”
I had no words, no beliefs of my own and I sat there unable to broach this barrier that had fallen between us. “That’s why I can’t leave,” said Abby. “It would be like abandoning him.” She laughed, but it was without pleasure.
“So much for, ‘Till death do us part.’”
I stared at the fire and listened to the logs crackling in the grate. Sap from a piece of pine began to hiss. “Have you seen a doctor?”
She reached into the pocket of her jeans and brought out a bottle. She rattled it and placed it on the table.
“Are you taking them?”
She shrugged.
“Sometimes.” Her eyes focused on the yellow flames of the fire.
“But they’re not what I need. I want David to leave me alone.”
“You have to stop this Abby. David killed himself six months ago.”
“That’s not what I mean. It’s not David as such, it’s his spirit…”
“His ghost?”
She played with the band of gold on her finger. It was loose.
“If you like.”
I took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. Picking up the bottle of
wine, I poured the last drop into my glass. “You should leave Abb. Sell the
cottage and leave.”
Playfully she pushed me with her foot.
“I believe you’ve already suggested that Ben,” she said.
* * *
It was still dark when I woke. Something (a noise, perhaps?) had disturbed my sleep. I rose and went to the window. Old habits die hard and even in winter I slept with it open. The curtains were blowing inward and a corner was tap, tap, tapping against the dresser set beneath. I pushed them to one side and looked out. It was the blackest of nights, but as I watched the moon broke free of the enveloping cloud and illuminated garden and fields.
There was a man, or so I thought, peering over the hedgerow at the bottom of the garden. All at once he swung his head to look at me and I felt a frisson, like ice water poured slowly over my back, of unexplained fear. I shuddered and dropped the curtains. Next time I looked, he was gone.
And outside the wind blew. It rattled the withered leaves like old men’s bones and whispered in the eaves like a dead man’s voice. And I swear it was David’s voice: broken and lost amongst the dead things that dwelt in darkness. I shivered and for the first time in many a long year I closed the window against the night. I went back to bed, but my sleep was poor and my dreams dark.
* * *
I woke to find the morning blanketed in heavy grey cloud. Abby was in the kitchen. Her melancholy of the previous night was submerged and if there was a shadow lurking behind her eyes she tried hard not to show it. After breakfast we drove into town. Abby picked up a week’s groceries and I trawled the market looking for second hand books.
It was just after one when we returned. The weather hadn’t improved but the forecast rain hadn’t materialized. So after lunch we went for a walk. Outside the cottage and bordered by an old beech wood, a lane ran east to west. A mile to the east lay Aldbury village, whilst west it terminated in open farmland. We turned left, following the lane past the garden to a rough piece of uncultivated land that sloped towards an ancient hedgerow.
Beyond was a huge open space known as the pageant field. A solitary oak stood in its centre. We climbed a stile cut into a hedge and as I placed my foot on the opposite step, an unaccountable sense of unease gripped me. The air grew still and I felt myself in a room without door or window, yet observed by something other than human. So strong was this sensation that I glanced to my left.
There was an old man. His head was bowed and with almost funereal dignity he silently watched me. At that moment a gust of wind jostled the trees and the old man’s head pivoted. He stared at me with mad vacant eyes and I froze. The wind blew stronger and like the wings of some hideous creature his black coat flew back and he spun around and around like a dervish lost in prayer.
My foot slipped from the wooden step and I tumbled over the stile. Head and shoulder hit hard and I lay on the ground, gasping for air.
Abby stood over me. “It’s actually for scaring the birds Ben.” She was trying not to laugh. The wind had dropped and the ‘Old Man’ hung limp upon the pole he was tied to.
I climbed gingerly to my feet and brushed myself down. “So I see.”
And so I did. I saw the overalls and the legs tied off into knots, the fingerless gloves and the stuffed Hessian sacking used to make a head. Someone had scrawled a wild face upon it.
With sudden insight, I grasped that this was the interloper spied from my bedroom window. His head wou
ld appear above the hedge whenever the wind blew. I took a step closer but Abby caught my arm.
“Don’t Ben,” she wrinkled her nose. “It stinks.”
I took another look and turned away. “C’mon Abb, let’s walk.”
Since the harvest the field had been turned then left fallow. Tramlines cut into the brown earth made perfect tracks for our feet. Far away, a line of hills supported the flat grey sky while the only mark of civilization was Aldbury’s church spire. I wondered about David. I couldn’t see him here, it wasn’t his ‘scene’ and I could not believe it was just Abby that held him.
“Do you think it was me?” We were walking the field edge and
Abby’s words broke my thoughts. “David,” she said. “Do you think it was me that made him do it?”
She had stopped walking and was staring at the hard ground. Her hands stretched the pockets of a winter jacket.
I went to her and touched her arm. “Don’t think like that Abb. He was ill.”
Abby nodded but with little real conviction. We began walking again. A few trees wrapped in mist marked the field boundary. I changed the subject.
“What’s it like in the summer?”
She brightened. “It’s beautiful.” She stopped and looked around. “Even so, I still love it like this.”
I nodded. There was something about the place. I could have been happy here. The brown earth turned beneath my feet.
“What about David?”
Abby shrugged. “He adored it at first. Later,” and there came a sigh from deep within, “I think he became rather bored.” Her face taut, she stared into the distance while her hidden hands twisted the material of her pockets. “I just didn’t see. Perhaps I didn’t want to see how unhappy he’d become.”
Gently I took her arm. “Don’t beat yourself up Abb. Nobody could have guessed what was going on in his mind.”
We had reached the apex of the field. A gap just large enough for a tractor to traverse opened out into a muddy lane. Other fields joined. I looked back. The scarecrow was twisting about its pole while a dozen crows, squabbling like children, hovered in the air above. A spasm ran down my back.
Abby was looking the other way. “Shall we head home?”
I pulled my coat tighter. “Sure, I could do with a cuppa.”
With the promise of tea and warmth, our pace quickened. “Fancy a drink tonight?”
Abby shrugged. “Into town?”
“What about the village? I noticed a pub on the way in.”
“The Judas Man?”
“Is that it?” My brows furrowed. “Strange name.”
Abby laughed and grabbed my arm. “If you think the name’s strange,” she opened her eyes wide. “Wait till you see the clientele.”
* * *
The Judas Man was old. The whitewashed exterior did little to disguise the roughly hewn sandstone blocks used in its construction. Like a disease, a lattice of ancient ivy clung to the walls. We passed through a portico entrance into a stone flagged bar. Talk dwindled as a row of heads turned to gawp. I smiled at the girl behind the bar. She didn’t reciprocate, but I felt her dark eyes burning into my back as we retreated to the lounge. The gentle burr of conversation resumed behind us.
The lounge turned out to be one large room separated into niches and small bays. It was darker here. Beneath leaded windows, dark wainscoting lined the walls. It had a timeless quality, at once ancient but completely in keeping with the present. Red cushioned chairs and benches (that, I guessed, had once eased backsides at prayer) ran around the perimeter, and furnished alcoves where assignations and privacy were assured. Couples and the odd larger party lounged around tables of dark oak. At either end of the bar were partly furled banners. I leant over the counter, just avoiding a phalanx of jugs hanging from hooks set into the low wooden beams.
It was the landlord who served us. He was talking to a man with sparse, wild hair when he saw us waiting. He made us wait a little longer. He nodded to Abby before his eyes settled on me. He was middle aged, with dark close-cropped hair turning to grey. A heavily built man running to fat, I imagined him to have been quite formidable in his youth.
I scanned the pumps and settled on a pint of Weetwood. He worked the pump, back and forth three times before slowing on the fourth and bringing the liquid up to the brim. I watched it settle. There was a haze, a blur of sediment marring the pint’s perfection and I held it up to the light. He watched as I studied the contents and pushed Abby’s glass of Riocha towards her.
“It’s a little cloudy,” I said as way of explanation. There was only the slightest pause before he placed both hands on the counter.
“Folks round ‘ere, drink with their mouths, not their eyes,” he said before inclining his head towards Abby. “Mrs Green.” Then he moved away and resumed his conversation.
We slunk off to an alcove cut into the wall. I sat down and pulled a face. Abby was doing her best to suppress a snigger. “I feel like a naughty schoolboy.”
She scrunched her face. “John’s alright once you know him.”
“And that reception. I felt like I had two heads.”
“Curiosity that’s all. I mean,” she widened her eyes, “the widow Green with a strange man.”
I took a tentative mouthful of beer and settled in. Abby sat with her back to the wall. Behind her were some cryptic words written in an ancient hand:
‘If Thou Would See the Face of God,
If Paradise Bound, Be Your Plan.
If the Flesh is Weak and Your Sins Are Found,
Be Sure to Seek the Judas Man.’
“Okay,” I said, “what’s a ‘Judas Man?’”
Abby turned her head and looked at the words. “That’s what I said when I first saw it.” She took a sip of wine. “It’s part of a poem, something to do with the rites of spring.”
She furrowed her brow. “The ‘Judas Man’ takes away winter’s gloom and gives absolution to those who have sinned during the year. They tell me in the old days, they used to bury or ‘plant’ a ‘Judas Man’ in the earth.”
I pulled a face and gazed around the room. It was deathly quiet. There was no pool table, no fruit or games machines and I wondered what the locals did for entertainment.
“Not many opportunities for absolving sins around here then?”
“Don’t you believe it!” Abby leaned forward to whisper. “Remember the girl behind the bar?”
I rubbed my back. Her dark eyes had left an indelible imprint.
“What did you think?”
I shook my head. “John’s daughter?”
“Fancy piece.”
My eyes widened. “You have got to be kidding. She’s…”
“Twenty-two.”
“And he’s…”
“Fifty.” Abby gulped her wine. “Wife moved out, she moved in.”
I puffed out my cheeks. Abby nodded towards the bar.
“And the man John’s talking to.”
Casually, I glanced over my shoulder. He had grim watchful eyes, the sort of eyes that warranted caution.
“That’s Bill,” said Abby. “David called him ‘Burglar Bill’. He can get you anything: from a rabbit to a stereo to a trained border collie.”
I shook my head and took a large mouthful of beer. “I take it back Abb. If I knew you were bringing me to a den of iniquity, I would have come prepared.”
I drained the last of my beer and stood up.
“Where are you going?”
I waved the empty glass towards the bar and winked. “Going to see a
man about a dog.”
* * *
We left before midnight. There were few lights on the lane leading to Abby’s home, but we linked arms and walked through the dark. As we neared the cottage Abby’s grip tightened. Her whole body stiffened and her pace slowed. Then she pulled up.
“Somebody’s been in my house.”
The door stood slightly ajar. Abby started forward, but I caught hold of her arm and pulled her b
ehind me. I motioned with my finger for silence and pushed the door with my foot. Darkness greeted me. Not the dark of moonlight and stars, of streetlights and hazy glows - but the dark of shadows, of deep black pits – of death itself.
And I found something else too: restlessness, a roving malevolence unable to find peace. It lay in recesses and corners, in the spaces beneath the floor, in hidden places where no one ventures. I sensed its presence, and I believe it sensed mine.
As I readied myself to cross that unwholesome threshold, I felt a swirl of air. As a blind man might greet a friend, it brushed my face. I held my breath. From deep within there came what sounded like a low moan and a burst of energy tore from the house. It knocked me from the step.
Abby broke and pushed past.
“It’s him, I know it is.” Almost hysterical, she rushed from room to room.
“David, David!”
I followed as best I could, flicking switches and flooding the cottage with light until I caught hold of her in the kitchen.
“It’s not David!”
I shook her till the mad light faded from her eyes and she collapsed against my shoulder.
“It’s not David,” I said my voice softening. “Maybe you forgot to lock the door?”
She shook her head. “You know I didn’t.”
“Then that guy – Bill. Is anything missing?”
But she wasn’t listening, she was staring over my shoulder. I followed her gaze. A drawer in the unit next to the sink was open and lying on the table was a photograph album. It was Abby’s wedding. Other pictures were scattered around the worktops. Photos of people laughing, people dancing – David pissed. And a picture of us all, the whole gang, champagne flutes raised.
The front door slammed. I turned Abby around and looked into her eyes.
“Wait here.” I took a torch from one of the drawers and went outside.
The garden was empty. So too was the piece of no-man’s land and I climbed the stile to view the other side. But I saw only shadows and a scarecrow tied to a stake. And as I held the light upon him and watched him dance on a cold night breeze, I had the strangest notion he knew answers to questions as yet unasked.