Worms

by James R. Montague

  ‘I didn’t expect you to arrive so soon,’ she said. ‘With all this rain we’ve been having I rush out into the garden the minute it stops. The weeds are springing up everywhere but you can’t set foot in the flowerbeds.’

  ‘Where’s Wilson?’ I asked. ‘Isn’t this one of the days he comes?’

  ‘He’s ill,’ she said. ‘Something on his chest. It’s been dragging on for some time.’ She took off her gardening gloves and laid them in the trug. ‘It’s funny but when I went to see him the other day he asked to speak to you.’

  I felt an immediate sense of unease. ‘Do you know what about?’

  ‘No, not really. He seems rather confused.’ She looked embarrassed. ‘He mentioned your wife for some reason. Perhaps it would be best if you did not see him.’

  I reflected quickly. ‘No,’ I said. ‘He probably wanted to offer his condolences. I think I should visit him. It seems the charitable thing to do. After all, he will be one of my new neighbours.’

  I was pleased to note an approving gleam in Mrs Valentine’s eye. ‘It’s a pleasure to hear you speak like that,’ she said. ‘When you read the papers and look at the television these days it’s difficult to believe that there’s any charity left in the world.’ I nodded modestly and expressed the hope that it would not be too much of an imposition if the van with my furniture entered by the drive. My new neighbour assured me that it would not and the process of unloading my meagre belongings began.

  I had looked forward to this moment of installation but, as is so often the case, the reality proved rather less than the expectation. It started to rain again just as the doors of the van were opened and the ground was soft which meant that mud was trampled into the house. The interior was cold, despite the fact that it was May, and of course there was neither running water nor electricity. Above all there was my nagging fear concerning Wilson. I could not help but feel that he knew something; I would not be able to rest until I had seen him.

  Within the hour my furniture and belongings were unloaded and I sat on the edge of a tea chest and glumly considered the task of stowing everything away that now faced me. I heard the van disappearing down the drive and then listened to the silence. Now I was alone. It was a sobering moment; I felt like a castaway who finds himself standing on the shore of an unknown island. This was where my new life began.

  I noticed that a fire had been laid in the newly finished grate and as I bent to light it there was a gentle tap on the front door. It was Mrs Valentine bearing a pot of tea.

  ‘Oh good,’ she said. ‘I’m glad you found the fire. I hope you don’t mind, I took the liberty of asking Betty to lay it. It’s cold for the time of year, isn’t it? I expect you’d care for a cup of tea after your long trip.’ I accepted gratefully and listened whilst she told me about her cleaning woman, Betty, who she thought would be prepared to come in a couple of mornings a week for me if I so desired.

  Mrs Valentine was going to be a very good neighbour, I decided: helpful but never overweeningly intrusive. She offered me the loan of a small cooking stove and told me where there was a tap in the garden from which I could get water but never suggested that I should use the amenities of her own house. That would clearly be overfamiliar behaviour as far as she was concerned, and I understood this attitude and respected it. Thoughtful as she was I did not wish to live cheek by jowl with her. Our cups of tea finished, she rose to take her leave and I asked her where Wilson lived.

  ‘Surely you’re not going to see him tonight? Not after your long journey and all the unpacking you have to do?’

  ‘I may feel like a walk later on,’ I said. ‘I imagine he doesn’t live too far away?’

  Mrs Valentine assured me that he did not and described a small cottage at the end of a path on the outskirts of the village. I remember feeling relieved that it seemed a lonely spot.

  ‘I suppose he has someone to look after him?’ I asked casually.

  She shook her head. ‘He used to have a wife but that was some years ago. There was a scandal and she went off to live with a man in Wells. He’s on his own now, as far as I know.’ She smiled demurely. ‘Sometimes around here, Mr Hildebrand, local people of a certain age who are alone form attachments that are not sanctified in church. You can never be certain.’ She looked round the room. ‘I see you have a lamp. If there is anything else you need, don’t hesitate to come to the house and ask. I am usually in bed by ten though, so I would be grateful if you could call before then.’

  I thanked her and saw her on her way. It was now after five o’clock and the rain was falling steadily. I unpacked for about an hour and then became bored; arranging plates and knives and forks in an unfinished kitchen was a tedious business and I suspected that it might be better to leave everything in the tea chests until all the work had been completed. I tended the fire and decided to go down and have a look at the boathouse. If the tide was in I might be able to test whether the rowing boat was seaworthy. I took the key for the water gate that I had been given by Mrs Valentine and descended the dark stairs. The door still jammed at the top and I made a note to tell the carpenter to plane a layer off the sides.

  When I came out on the jetty it was to find that the tide was in – also, that there was the same disagreeable rotting smell as on my first visit. This surprised me as I had thought it must have come from the exposed muddy banks of the dyke and would disappear at high tide. I screwed up my nostrils and approached the rowing boat which was now half-propped against the back end of the jetty. The smell grew more intense. At first I thought that it must be something in the boat but there was nothing obviously visible. I pulled the boat away from the wall and immediately started back in disgust, almost letting go of the gunwale. A strip of fisherman’s netting hung across the end of the dyke and entangled in it was a large dead seabird. It was a goose of some description but so clogged with oil as to make identification impossible. I imagined that the poor brute, half blinded and unable to fly, had struggled inland from the sea and eventually expired here at the end of one of the labyrinth of dykes that led off the main river. Two more pathetic bags of oily feathers suspended nearby suggested that other birds had met the same fate.

  I struggled to overcome my repugnance and looked round for something to remove the grisly relics. A boat-hook hung nearby and I gritted my teeth and plucked it down. Gingerly I prodded at the large bulk of the bird and immediately, like spines on a porcupine’s back, a host of red worms sprang menacingly from the blackened plumage. Their heads waved in the air as if demonstrating rage at being disturbed and one actually detached itself from the corpse it was devouring and started to crawl up the boathook towards me. Disgusted and nauseated, I hurled the staff across the jetty. Having successfully driven off my attack, the worms withdrew into the body of the bird. The stench was even more penetrating. I imagined those ghastly creatures churning through its tripes and nearly vomited. I was powerless and translated the contempt I felt for my own inability to grapple with the situation into hatred of the worms. I must destroy them, yet I could not bring myself to touch the bird again.

  Thinking quickly, I remembered the paraffin that I had brought for my two lamps. I retired up the stairs and returned with the bright red can and a kitchen chair. I carefully placed the chair at the edge of the jetty against the wall and climbed onto it with the can. Conquering mounting nausea, I leaned forward and doused the three birds with paraffin. My teeth grinding together with hatred, I contemplated the fate of the worms; so far in all our encounters I had remained passive, I had not wanted to believe that I was over-reacting to coincidence. Now I felt threatened, just as I did by Wilson. It was chilling how the worms insinuated themselves into my human predicaments. As I dealt with them so must I deal with life. I splashed paraffin across the net and stepped down from the chair; as I moved it aside and screwed the cap on the can, I saw that worms were beginning to leave the bird and drop into the water. No doubt it was the paraffin driving them out, but I had an uneasy feeling that their acti
on denoted a prescience far beyond that possessed by ordinary invertebrates. I fumbled for my matches and in my hurry spilled half the box across the floor. I struck one and tossed the flaring flame towards the netting. There was a flash and I ducked away, raising my hand to protect my face. When I turned back the dead bird was burning with a green flame and making a hissing noise like a wet log on a fire. The strands of the netting flared up and then turned black and grey. Burning worms fell writhing into the water and then sank like lead shot; there was a repetitive popping noise like a burnt sausage exploding in a frying pan. The central section of the netting parted and the feathered corpses dropped into the water; for a moment they sizzled on the surface and then slowly sank from sight, leaving a greasy film on the surface of the water.

  I watched the macabre spectacle with my eyelashes singeing and the flames burning my cheeks. When I bent to pick up the boathook I found that I was breathing heavily and that my hands were shaking. I looked carefully for that worm that had been advancing towards me but it had disappeared. The wary gesture reflected my feeling towards the worms: I was frightened of them and I believed that they meant to harm me. I pulled down the rest of the netting and burnt it on the jetty, brushing the grey ash into the water. What terrified me most of all was that I associated the worms with my wife – it was as if they were her agents sent to punish me. I remembered the incident when her body had been retrieved from the sluice, the memory of the worms wriggling from her mouth and nose so powerful that it seemed to be happening all over again. Even when I closed my eyes I could not shut it out. I turned away and something wet and slimy brushed against my cheek. I leapt backwards and found that it was a piece of fibre trailing from a folding chair that had been laid along the roof beams.

  My heart was pumping and I no longer had a desire to test the rowing boat. The very thought of floating above those writhing predators in a vessel that might not be seaworthy made my flesh creep. I could imagine sinking in the water and feeling them attaching themselves to my skin. Individually at first, then in their tens, and their hundreds, and their thousands. . . .

  I almost ran to the door at the foot of the stairs and closed and bolted it behind me. As I climbed I realized with a sickening sense of fear that I was already on the defensive.

  I had laid out tins of sausages, beans and pineapple chunks for my supper, but now my appetite had disappeared and I put them to one side. I had never been a drinking man but I helped myself to a large measure of brandy. Once again I repeated the refrain that had been running through my mind like the burden of a popular song: ‘There is nothing to fear except fear itself’. I must not get things out of proportion; the worms were unpleasant, even revolting, but they could cause me no physical harm; they were not blood-sucking leeches from the trees in some tropical jungle. It must be my worry about Wilson that was causing me to over-react. He was the danger, not a few wriggling creatures. I tried to prime myself against worries that had no rational basis and decided that I would visit Wilson as soon as it got dark. Once I had put my fears at rest there, the rest of my life might fall into place.

  It was with another shot of brandy under my belt that I eventually set off towards the village. I used the side door in the wall of Marsh House and skirted the grounds. My car was parked in the driveway outside the house and I did not want to disturb Mrs Valentine – that was one of my reasons anyway. I stepped into the hedge when any cars approached and had soon covered the distance to the outskirts of the village. There was a new moon above, hardly visible through heavy cloud, and a steady drizzle to keep most people indoors. I met no one.

  Mrs Valentine’s directions had been precise and I had no difficulty in finding the pathway. What came as an unpleasant surprise to me was to see a police car parked beside it. There was a small hidden lay-by and I imagined that the police were operating a speed trap as people came out of the village – either that or enjoying a cigarette whilst on patrol. I waited in the shadows and it was not until a car went past that I saw by the light of its headlights that there was no one in the police car. Immediately I began to feel uneasy. Was it possible that the police were with Wilson in his cottage? Could he be making a statement? The inference may seem far-fetched but it is amazing how the mind of a guilty man will jump to conclusions when he feels threatened.

  I waited for another five minutes and then heard someone coming from the direction of the path; I moved closer to the hedge until the wet foliage was brushing against my cheek and saw a policeman in a peaked cap approach the car and get into it. The light remained on and I could see that he was writing something, probably making a report. He returned a pen to his breast pocket, the light went off and seconds later the car pulled away. I waited until its lights had disappeared and debated what to do. If anything, I was even more uneasy. An owl hooted nearby and when I saw something glistening on my foot I discovered that it was a large slug. I scraped it off and stamped on it. For a reason that I could not properly analyse, I felt like turning back. The presence of the police car seemed like a warning omen. With a start of fear I wondered if the policeman was now on his way to see me . . . Of course not. Nobody would know that I had arrived in the village – unless Mrs Valentine had said anything. The police were often very well informed; they knew what was going on.

  In the end I decided that I would at least find out where exactly Wilson’s cottage was; the policeman may well have been calling on somebody else. I approached the path and started to pick my way through the puddles. What a spring – nobody could remember one like it; the countryside was drowning, and the cottage when I came to it seemed to have sunk into the muddy ground. It was surrounded by a well-worked vegetable garden and a high hedge. It needed re-thatching and the roof had a scruffy, unkempt appearance like a pudding-basin haircut made with a pair of blunt scissors. The only light visible showed through a crack in the tightly drawn curtains of the room on the right of the front door.

  I was wondering what to do when I heard somebody coming from the direction of the road. There was the wheezing note of an old bicycle and a light that wavered from side to side as the rider tried to steer a passage through the puddles. I panicked and ran on down the path until I found a place where I could duck in beside an overhanging tree. I did not want anyone to see me if it could be avoided. Once again I pressed back into the dripping leaves and felt icy water running down my neck. Cold and uncomfortable I waited for the cyclist to pass. Seconds turned into a minute and I realized that the bicycle must have stopped at the cottage. I peered out cautiously and retraced my footsteps. Through the hedge I could see a light bobbing towards the front door; a woman’s bike had been left outside the gate. It was difficult to see clearly but I could make out the outline of a woman wearing a scarf over her head; her figure was not that of a young girl. As she approached the front door it opened and I could see Wilson silhouetted in the porch light. He reached out a hand towards the woman and she took it and allowed herself to be drawn into the cottage. At the last moment she looked back over her shoulder as if wanting to make sure that she had not been followed, and I glimpsed the face of a middle-aged woman whom I did not recognize. The door closed and all was darkness and falling rain.

  Any regret that I felt about not being able to talk to Wilson was tempered with relief. At least I had avoided bumping into the police or the woman, whom I supposed to be his mistress. Mrs Valentine had hinted at the existence of such a person in the general sense but I imagined that she was probably being discreet and had a much more exact knowledge of Wilson’s domestic arrangements than she thought it politic to reveal to me. I wondered if the woman was a permanent fixture, but there had been something furtive about her arrival that suggested otherwise.

  I retraced my steps down the path and walked back to Marsh House without incident. The rain was now coming down even more heavily and I decided to approach my new home by the main drive rather than via the waterlogged track that skirted the marsh. Mrs Valentine would hardly think it an intrusion at this t
ime of night and anyway it was well past her bedtime. I approached the house down the line of glistening, dripping laurels that seemed to be choking the drive and was surprised to see that there was a light still on in one of the downstairs rooms. The impression I had formed of Mrs Valentine was that of a woman who would scrupulously turn off all lights before retiring to bed. I passed the window and then hesitated; in the few times that I had come up to Norfolk to supervise the work of the builders, I had hardly set foot inside Marsh House – I had always felt that Mrs Valentine wished to maintain a discreet distance between us and that to make a point of preserving her house as her own private domain was a sensible way of doing so. Nevertheless I was intrigued to see what lay beyond the long, dark entrance hall with its potted plants on the inlaid tables and the antelope heads staring glassy-eyed from their wooden plaques. Perhaps also I had derived a vicarious pleasure from spying on the malingering Wilson and wished to repeat the experience.

  I stood still for a moment and listened. There was only the sound of the wind, and the rain pattering against the leaves. I stepped forward to the flowerbed and ducked down below the level of the window. It was wet under foot but I was already soaked after my experiences of the evening. Slowly, I raised my head, keeping to the left of the narrow opening in the curtain; I edged along the windowsill until I could see into the room. It was lofty and scattered with pieces of furniture in the grand manner; there were paintings on the wall and a fine fireplace of dark green marble. There was no fire in the grate but before it stood Mrs Valentine, wearing a long nightdress and gown of the same flimsy coffee-coloured material. She was looking up at a portrait which hung above the fireplace and showed a distinguished-looking man in a city suit. He sported a military moustache and the artist had captured the autocratic mien of a man used to giving orders. For almost a minute, Mrs Valentine stared at the portrait and I assumed that it must be of her late husband. She then turned away and skirted a long sofa to approach the table behind it, so that she was now facing me. With her hair in disarray her face seemed much softer and younger; her expression was difficult to read – calm but thoughtful, as if reflecting upon some event that lay in the past or perhaps even in the future.