The Grin of the Dark

by Ramsey Campbell

  'Excuse me,' I call, but the staff are nowhere to be seen. 'Excuse me,' I shout as a trickle of blackness rises from the monitor.

  'Sssh.'

  'Don't shush me. Where are you? Anyone,' I yell and give up. 'I'll do it myself. You don't want the place on fire.'

  What could anybody do except twist the spooling knobs? The microfilm coils like a mutilated snake out of both sides of the viewer, scattering the table with flakes of blackened celluloid. The librarian hurries out from behind the shelves and emits a small cry at the last of the smoke but is otherwise as silent as any library could require until she's standing over me. 'I do know you,' she says.

  'I didn't really pinch your power last time. That was just a joke.'

  'We never did find out what went wrong.'

  'Well, not me. Sorry about this. It must have jammed.'

  She retrieves the sections of microfilm and carries them to the desk. 'Will you be wanting anything else?'

  I can't judge whether she's being professional or sarcastic. I shouldn't risk another mishap – I can paraphrase what I recall. A charred fragment of microfilm is isolated on the screen. Rather than strain to be certain whether the letters it contains spell hack, I say 'Could I buy some time online?'

  She moves to the table ahead of me and activates a computer. As I log onto my Frugonet account I hear brushing and sharp polite coughs at my back to remind me that she's cleaning the viewer. Willie Hart has emailed at last. I swallow a taste of my mother's defiantly unhealthy breakfast as I open the message.

  si –

  sore 4 silnce. no good nus im afrad. hop u got all u neded out of vuing. no 2nd chanc. u got guillermo 2 nthusd. he wachd 1 film 2 ofn & it wnt on fir. so did rest whn he trid 2 put it out. all films dstroyd & he ran off. ull realize iv not had tim 2 chec w girls. theyr filming in la whil i try 2 sort out insuranc clam & carer. but im sur if tha filmd u it wud hav ben a jok.

  wile

  I spend far too long in decoding sore as sorry and carer as career and tha as they, and then I wonder why she failed to contract realize. She must be preoccupied with her loss. Confusion is spreading through my skull as the blackness did onscreen, and I have to stop myself fancying that the film in the library viewer might have ignited out of sympathy with hers. I can't think of a reply to send her; I need to check that Smilemime hasn't been active. But he has, and I swallow a harsh stale taste as I bring up the message that's strewn through the newsgroups.

  So Mr Questionabble wants his link, does he? Sorry, I forgot his name's suppossed to be Simon Lester. Do we think he'll shut up and go away if I post one? That's what he said I had to do. Let's think of an address for him. How about www.missionleer.com? That's him leering at us. Or there's www.emitsmorsel.com, which is all he ever does. Then there's www.silentmorse.com that shows how he keeps using a secret code. Where else shall we look for him? He ought to have a site at www.imtrollsee.com.

  'Don't you call me a troll, you skulking little shit. I'm not the one that's too afraid to say my name. It doesn't spell that either. It's not even the right number of letters. You can't count and you can't spell.'

  'Sssh.'

  'You try keeping quiet when somebody's calling you names.' I don't say this aloud, but perhaps I mouth it while staring at the librarian behind the counter. 'Carry on, get all the links out of your head. I won't be following any of them,' I vow under my breath as I scroll down Smilemime's message.

  He should be at www.istoremslen.com. Len's his partner in crime, which is to say himself. What's his name suppossed to be again, Collin Vernon? If you take Len out of that you get www.iconvrow.com. Vrow is Dutch for woman, and I'll bet he's conned one like he's trying with the rest of us.

  I fight off a memory of Amsterdam – of a whitish slab that quakes with mirth as it peeps wide-eyed from under the bed. 'Going Dutch now, are we?' I mutter and try to ignore a sense of being watched.

  Let's hope she reads this if he doesn't do something bad to stop her. Maybe she ought to look at www.snormalsite.com to see what he thinks is normall,

  'The opposite of you, you obsessive deranged Christ I can't even think of a name for it. Can't you even spell the same way twice?'

  and www.msmoresin.com, because a mannuscript's his sin. But the one he's hoping nobody would find beccause it hasn't got his name on is www.tubbiesfilms.com. Hasn't it gone sillent all of a sudden? I don't think we'll be hearing anny more about Mister Vernon Lester's book that he wanted us to think was the first studdy of the subbject. Goodbye if you've got any sense. Let's have more silents.

  I can't help hoping Colin has responded, but there's no riposte. I swallow a taste or an equally harsh laugh and copy the final link into the address box. The computer hesitates, and then a blue line that might be underscoring an invisible or non-existent word starts to crawl along the bottom of the screen. Before it's half completed, the screen flickers or my vision does, and a page appears. I grin so fiercely that my face feels swollen. The site hasn't been found.

  It's as much of an invention as all the other sites Smilemime listed. 'Funny thing, I won't be keeping quiet,' I say and reach for the keyboard, only to be irritated by a possibility. Would even Smilemime have misspelled the name? Purely for confirmation, I type www.tubbysfilms.com in the box. As the blue line inches towards completion an eager page fills the screen.

  THE SILENT FILMS OF TUBBY THACKERAY AND ORVILLE HART.

  By Vincent Steele.

  It looks like the title page of a student's thesis or some even more unpublished item. The typeface gives it the appearance of a manuscript that has been submitted for approval. I send the blank expanse of the rest of the page up the screen, and then I suck in a breath I can't hear for the throbbing of my head.

  Chapter 1: An Overview of the Careers of Thackeray and Hart.

  We shouldn't think of history as fixed. That goes for the cinema too now that so many lost films are being rediscovered. Sometimes we could think they're memories repressed by the collective unconscious. We can see why people preferred to forget Stepin Fetchit, but how long will anyone remember he existed? Audiences once laughed at Max Davidson, but by now few people even recall how his brand of Jewish humour was judged unacceptable...

  It's my opening chapter with a few words changed. The entire text is, and worse still, it more succinctly expresses everything I wrote. As I scroll past the end of the chapter I grow insanely fearful that the screen will show me thoughts I've had but not yet written. The only further matter is the date the site was last updated. According to the bottom line, that was weeks before I emailed my chapter to Colin.

  It isn't true. Whoever created the site – who else but Smilemime – could have put in any date. I'm clinging to the notion as the nearest thing I have to reassurance when the librarian comes over to murmur 'Please be quieter or we'll have to ask you to leave.'

  I've no idea what sounds I may have been uttering – very likely less than words. I respond as best I'm able, but she doubles her frown. 'I beg your pardon?' she by no means begs.

  'I said you can ask.' Surely I didn't say cunt arse. 'Who am I supposed to be disturbing?' I object. 'There's nobody else here.'

  I mean other than her colleagues. Whoever's laughing uncontrollably is somewhere beyond the room, although the noise is so invasive that she would be better employed in hushing it instead of me. When her gaze doesn't leave me I blurt 'I'll go as soon as I've dealt with this.'

  I email Colin that our correspondence has been hacked into and copy the address of the web site and exhort him and the university to do their worst. 'That wasn't too noisy, was it?' I say, only for my chair to rouse the echoes with a screech on the linoleum. 'Merry Christmas.'

  I'm heading for the exit when the librarian says 'You've not paid.'

  I struggle to contain my rage. 'Will you take a card?' I say like a Christmas conjurer.

  'Not for two pounds. That's the minimum charge.'

  I dig in my hip pocket, but my hand is shaking so much I can barely grasp my change.
The librarian watches the jerky movements of my fist inside my trousers with disfavour until I dump the coins on the counter. 'Ninety shits, nine tits even,' I surely can't be saying as my almost uncontrollable forefinger pokes at the cash. 'And a big one, and another little one. Go on, take my last penny. You won't get all that in your pudding,' I seem compelled to joke.

  I can't quite believe I'm seeing her recount the money. Suppose she calls security for the sake of a few pence? Here comes a guard – someone with big feet, at any rate. As the footsteps halt somewhere out of sight the librarian begins to plant the coins in various compartments of a drawer. 'I'll be off before I can cause any more chaos,' I tell her. 'Have a merry one.'

  Does she murmur in response, or is it an echo? When I emerge from the reference library I can't decide whether the renovations have created a new maze. Plastic rustles beyond the stairs, where the unidentifiable towering figure in the ground-floor vestibule is still shrouded in the material. Outside, the chill that turns my breath white aggravates my shivers as I fumble out my mobile. I grit my teeth in an expression that makes several Christmas shoppers stay well clear as I suffer through the celebratory message tape. 'Eck your chemail, for Christ's sake,' I blurt, and my teeth also get in the way of my next line. 'We need to find out how this wastard stole my burk.'

  I won't be emailing any more of it. That lets me feel a little less vulnerable, but not enough. Having no money in my pocket doesn't help. I skirt the covered market, where the stallholders are wearing almost every size of droopy red hat, and find a branch of my bank. I insert my debit card in the machine embedded in the old stone wall and type my secret number, and wait, and lean forward to peer at the display, which looks pale with frost or with my breath. Then the world seems to tilt in sympathy, and I become aware of saying no, louder and louder. In the queue behind me a woman says 'You should be in a film.'

  FORTY-TWO - TESS

  The white bobble of the personal adviser's red hat blunders against her eyebrows as she lifts her chubby face, and she grins as if I've made a joke or am one. She shakes her head to lodge the bobble behind her ear as she says 'How can we help you today?'

  I've queued ten minutes for a festively attired clerk to inform me that I have to consult a personal adviser, and as long again before this one became available, which is another reason why I blurt 'More than you have been recently, I hope.'

  Her wide lips close over her grin and reopen little more than a slit. I'm reminded of the one that mouthed my debit card. 'Do you bank at this branch?' it enquires.

  'No, in London. Egham, rather. I need to change that.'

  'I'm afraid you can't do that here. You'll need – '

  'I don't want to.'

  'Excuse me, I thought you just said you did.'

  'Not now,' I protest, feeling in danger of becoming trapped in a ponderous comedy routine. 'Not here.'

  'Then what seems to be the problem?'

  'It more than seems. Let me have a look at my accounts. Here's who I am.'

  As she examines my debit card the bobble deals her brow a gentle thump. She sweeps it back and says 'Anything else, Mr Lester?'

  'What's wrong with that? It's yours, I mean your bank's.'

  'It's just that we need at least two forms of identification before we can give out personal details.'

  'Look, this doesn't make sense. Your machine would have given me money with just the card and no questions asked.'

  'I can see it could seem funny, but – '

  'No, it doesn't seem the least bit bloody funny. Nothing does,' I say so loudly that it appears to jar my phone awake. If the caller is Colin or Rufus, can he identify me? But the display shows Natalie's number. I'm striving to think how she could help me persuade the adviser as I exclaim 'Hello.'

  'Ow,' Mark says and laughs.

  'Sorry, Mark. Didn't mean to be so loud, but what do you want? I'm rather busy here just now.'

  'Where are you? We can't see you.'

  'What are you talking about? Don't joke.'

  'We went in the library but the lady said you'd gone, and we can't find you.'

  'I'm at my bank. Go past the market and you'll see it on the way to Granddad and Grandma Lester's. Tell your mother to hurry, will you? She may be able to help.'

  As I end the call I realise she won't need to. 'I'll show you,' I tell the adviser. 'Come outside.'

  I hold the street door open until she has to follow, and then my urgency tails off. Three people are queuing at the cash machine, all of them with mobile phones. The girl in front of me is using hers to film her grin, and I feel included in the image. I occupy the wait by smiling at the adviser between glances in search of Natalie and Mark, but her straight lips are as unyielding as metal. At last I reach the machine. As I type my number I'm suddenly afraid that the system will reject it and confiscate my card. Isn't there a limit to the number of times you can present a card within a given period? Then the screen exhibits the lack of funds in my current account and, once I've typed the account number, the deposit. 'There,' I say in a parody of triumph. 'Happy now?'

  'I'm afraid you're overdrawn, Mr – I'm sorry, I've forgotten your name.'

  'I know that. I mean I know I'm, no, I'm not overdrawn. You've pinched my money. Let's go and see why, shall we? And the name's Lester. Lester. Lester. Lester.'

  I manage to stop repeating it as I usher her into the bank, under a wreath of holly that makes me feel they're celebrating my predicament. At least my performance at the machine has convinced the adviser, unless she's simply anxious to be rid of me or has taken pity on me for Christmas. She brings up my details on her monitor and turns the screen to some extent towards me. 'You've made a large payment,' she says in case I'm unable to read. 'Reference LUP. Will you know what that is?'

  'Yes, it's your mistake,' I say less distinctly than I'd like as stronger words struggle to emerge. The debit is exactly the amount of the advance for my book, but I won't believe that's more than a coincidence. 'You've already done this to me once and you said you'd fix it,' I complain. 'Does that look fixed to you? Don't you have any control over your computers?'

  The adviser makes it clear she's waiting to be sure I've finished before she says 'I don't suppose you'd remember who you spoke to.'

  'Her name's Tess. I don't forget names.' Perhaps that's an unnecessary gibe, but I think it's reasonable to add 'I don't know why you have that emergency number if you can't sort out mistakes by phoning.'

  'I'll do that for you now.' Indeed, she's already dialling. 'Hello, it's Millie at Preston central branch. Is Tess available? I've a customer with a query,' she says and hands me the receiver.

  'It's a hell of a lot more than that. Let's try and stay together this time, Tess, and maybe – '

  'Tom speaking. May I take your name?'

  'You're not Tess.' I feel even stupider for saying so. 'Never mind. My name, let's make this the last time, it's Simon Lester.'

  'I'll just take some details for security.'

  'Your colleague can identify me. She's looking straight at me.' Rather than say this, I gabble my account number and sort code and mother's maiden name and am able to read from the screen the amount paid on a standing order for my share of the phone and Internet bill at the house in Egham. 'I'll need to cancel that,' I realise aloud.

  'That's why you're calling.'

  'You think I'd go through all that rigmarole for a few quid? Go ahead, cut it off, but that's not why I'm here. See the fortune that's vanished from my account? That's what my publishers paid me. You don't pay it to them. You've done it before and it wasn't funny then.' I'm driven by a nervous fancy that all these words are outdistancing nonsense I would otherwise utter. 'And don't tell me I've got to write in,' I carry on. 'I did that last time when you asked me and it hasn't worked, has it? This needs to be sorted out while I'm on the phone. You owe me that much.'

  There's silence before Tom of the bank says 'Who was it you spoke to again?'

  'She's already told you. Millie here did
, I mean. Tess.'

  'I'm afraid nobody of that name works here.'

  I stare at the adviser, who seems to be avoiding my gaze. 'Then I must have been put through to a different section.'

  'You only could have come through here,' says Tom.

  'All right, so who sounds like Tess? She was breaking up when I talked to her.'

  'I'm sorry, I don't understand.'

  'Coming apart, and don't say I sound as if I am.' That's also meant for the adviser with her eloquently averted gaze. 'Her voice was. I mustn't have got her whole name.'

  'We have nobody called anything like Tess.'

  'Then who are you saying she was?' I retort, more savagely as I hear laughter at my back. I'm about to confront whoever finds my confusion amusing when I realise that an object has been planted on my head. Something akin to a fat pallid spider dangles close to my eyes, and as I slap it away I see my faint reflection overlaid on the display of my poverty. I've acquired a jester's cap complete with a silent bell. I snatch it off and fling it across the bank as I whirl around, almost toppling the chair. Too late I see it was a Christmas hat, the kind Natalie and Mark are wearing. Nevertheless I demand 'What are you trying to do to me, Mark?'

  Though his broad grin wavers, it doesn't shrink. 'We got them in the market. I thought you'd like one too.'

  'I did say you should wait, Mark.'

  His mother sounds as if she's trying to console him. If he's upset by my reaction, why is he still grinning? Perhaps her tone is aimed at me, because she's gazing at the computer screen. 'Oh, Simon,' she says.

  'Don't worry, it's going to be dealt with. I won't move until it is.'

  Mark retrieves the hat from the counter in front of a teller's window, beyond which a silhouette on a blind is typing at a computer. 'Don't you want it?' he asks me.