Through a Glass Darkly

by Bill Hussey

  ‘Or maybe it was for reasons of convenience,’ Dawn said. ‘Assuming the murderer doesn’t have a fixation on Catholic boys, what are we left with? Someone who kills Catholic boys because they are easy targets for him. He has a way of knowing who they are, what they are like, what families they come from. That suggests someone who is part of the local Catholic community. Is there a diocese magazine that would include articles about young people in the Church?’

  ‘The Good News Gazette.’

  ‘And that would be sent to Catholic hospices, retirement homes …?’

  ‘Free of charge.’

  ‘That leads me to my second question. I think you may have omitted to tell us something about Father Asher Brody.’

  Jamie skived both first and second periods. He had been sitting in a cubicle for the best part of two hours, staring at patterns of ghostly graffiti. Each morning Mr McGregor, the caretaker, would scrub away at the doors, but traces always remained. Jamie now took a strange comfort from this everyday cycle of filthy scrawls and harsh bleach. It was predictable. It was real. He rested his head against the cold plywood partition and asked:

  What the fuck’s wrong with me?

  Sophie Antmar would say it was a tumour. That was her explanation whenever someone acted out of character. It was probably because her mum had died from a tumour when she was little. Maybe it was a tumour pressing down on his brain, fucking up that area where memory was stored. After all, he couldn’t for the life of him remember what had happened on Sunday behind his grandad’s house, or what had happened last night in his bedroom. There were only two impressions growing in his mind, though he could make little sense of them. The first was visual: the Scarecrow, the Batman villain who terrorized all Gothamites with his toxic nerve gas. The other was emotional: a senseless desperation. It had begun as a niggle, no more powerful than the guilt of putting off homework. Now he found it hard to hear his own thoughts above the cries in his head:

  You must see Jack. He will save you … Save me? From what? From what you saw. From what waits for you on the bridge …

  The door at the far end of the lavatory block sighed open. It was probably Mr McGregor doing a skiver inspection. He waited for the high Glaswegian voice to shriek: ‘Ah ken spy y’ah tootsies, boy.’ Instead there came a quick burst of teacher’s-out-of-the-room-chatter from a nearby classroom. Then, with a pneumatic hiss, the door clicked shut.

  Pipes clanked and urinal sprays spluttered and whooshed. No sounds came from the newcomer. Jamie swallowed hard. The hum of the tube lighting overhead stammered. In a series of plinks, the lights switched off, one by one. Splodges of bleach-layered graffiti shone in the sudden gloom.

  Darkness and silence. And then a scraping sound, as of someone dragging their nails across a blackboard, screeched along the cubicle doors. It was not Mr McGregor. Jamie glanced up at the frosted windows above the partition. A black shape fluttered against the glass and perched on the sill. From the playing fields came the pip of Mr Grayes’ whistle and cries of ‘Foul! Cheating bastard!’ Through the wall behind him, Jamie could hear Fuckface Fosker’s monotone drone. For the first time in his life, he wished he was taking notes on the causes of coastal erosion.

  He is here. Who …? He who whispers to you.

  Jamie tucked up his legs and held his knees to his chest. He shuffled along the seat until his back rested against the cistern. The urinal sprays fizzled out and the water glugged away. Below the door, a lean shadow glided across the floor. Jamie knew that your shoes could be as clean as the Queen’s arse, but you always left a mark on those piss-gleaming tiles. There were no marks, however, because He did not walk.

  Those scraping nails reached Jamie’s cubicle and tapped upon the door. Tick-Tick-Tick. And at their insistence the boy felt a tickle at the back of his throat. He gagged and coughed up something wriggling and black. The beetle rolled onto its back, legs kicking, mandibles pinching at the sputum that coated its body. Suddenly, Jamie saw himself lying on his bed, woven inside a living husk. He remembered the chatter in his ears, against the lobes of his brain. He remembered the taste of pupa, the crunch of carapace, the sting of probosces and pulse of larvae. And he remembered the certainty of death that had overtaken him.

  A voice rasped, ‘Let’s play a gamey, Jamie.’

  His mum used to say that. Let’s play a gamey, Jamie …

  ‘Please … please go away.’

  Tick-Tick-Tick

  ‘Open up. It’s your old uncle Funnyface come to call.’

  ‘No. Fuck off … Please, just …’

  ‘Now, now. There’s only one person who can make me go away, and he’s not here. It’s time we had a little face to face, Jamie. You remember my face, don’t you? Once seen never forgotten, eh?’

  Jamie’s bladder gave way. Piss soaked through his trousers and dribbled over the toilet seat. The flow stung his hands, but he did not – could not – move. There was a click as the lock snapped up of its own accord.

  ‘Oh, yes, I’ll let you see me one more time. Just once more before the end. When next we meet I’ll be picking your flesh from between my teeth.’

  Fingers, as twisted and brittle as twigs, arched around the door. A rotting stink began to overpower the brew of shit and piss and bleach.

  The door opened. A foot fell upon the beetle, cracked it apart and smeared its soft insides across the tiles.

  ‘Time for a little screaming, I think.’

  Twenty-nine

  ‘… so, as I said, I hardly looked up from my desk for a month,’ Geraldine Pryce continued. ‘But as busy as I was, I was growing more aware of the uniqueness, for want of a better word, of Crow Haven. It seemed to exist in a kind of vacuum. Outside events did not register in the consciousness of its inhabitants. I was in the post office the day the IRA bombed the Tory conference and happened to mention it. Blank faces all round. During the years I’ve lived here, I have never heard a villager speak of news from the outside. Tianaman Square, Diana, September 11th: these things don’t penetrate Crow Haven. It has enough of its own tragedy, I suppose. Anyway, it was the day after the conference bombing, actually. I was feeling unwell …’

  Crow Haven: October 1984 – January 1985

  Two days before, Geraldine had found a small, hard lump beneath her left breast. Tests would later show that it was benign. Within weeks it had been removed. On that October morning, however, she had been sick with fear. By the time she reached the surgery, she was finding it hard to keep the terror out of her voice.

  ‘Miss Pryce, to see Dr Hathaway.’

  ‘Take a seat, Miss Pryce.’

  The receptionist beamed. Geraldine recognised that wide, faintly patronising smile as one that she might use herself fifty times during an average school day. I don’t want to be humoured and I don’t want to wait, she screamed inwardly. Will they take my breast? I’m very plain, not womanly at all, but don’t take my breast.

  She told herself to stop being silly. But already her femininity felt like it was slipping away. She looked across at the paragon of womanhood sitting opposite. Golden hair, sensuously bowed lips, full breasts. The girl seemed to notice eyes on her body. Flustered, Geraldine recognised the young woman.

  ‘Anne. I’m sorry, I didn’t see you there. Funny how that happens at the doctor’s. So wrapped up in our little ailments, we look right through people.’

  Anne Malahyde drew her cardigan around her and slouched in the seat. Geraldine was anxious to explain why she had been ogling the girl, but could not frame the excuse. They sat in silence. In the moments that followed, Geraldine’s embarrassment gave way to a prickly irritation. Surely the child wasn’t so stupid as to believe … She must ask Anne a question, or she might say something regrettable.

  ‘Are you here for a prenatal check-up? You’re over the morning sickness, I hope?’

  ‘Peter’s ill.’

  ‘Really? What’s the matter …’

  ‘Nappy rash, I’m afraid,’ Peter broke in. ‘Hello, Gerry. Bett
er not kiss me.’

  The other patients in the waiting room each found something to become engrossed in as Peter came out. Geraldine couldn’t blame them. His face glowed bright with ointment but beneath the balm, his skin was peeling badly. Boils and sores rimmed his hairline and the corners of his eyes.

  ‘Good Lord, Peter, what’s happened to you?’

  ‘They think it’s a rather nasty form of psoriasis. We’ve just got back from the Seychelles, but three weeks laying about didn’t seem to help. We’re seeing a specialist tomorrow. I only came to this quack for something to relieve the itching. How are you, Gerry? Not seen you since I ran you down.’

  ‘School’s been murder. I promise I’ll visit soon.’

  ‘Good girl. By the way, did you hear about poor old Brody? Had a heart attack. Only a warning, thank God …’

  Despite her promise, Geraldine did not see Peter for another three weeks. Ten days after her appointment, she received the all-clear, but she could not set her mind at ease until the growth had been removed. Dozens of times a day, leading up to the operation, she would feel the small, hard pebble in her breast and convince herself that it had grown. Doctors, after all, were always making mistakes.

  In fact, during this time, she didn’t give Peter a second thought. But a few days after the operation, when the world fell back into place, she decided to honour her promise. It was now early November, and the school day began and ended in darkness. At five o’clock on a Friday afternoon, she hurried through the last of her tasks. She finished writing a letter to a disgruntled governor, explaining why his son hadn’t been picked for the intramural spelling competition, and left the caretaker to lock up the school.

  No-one, save herself, moved through the streets of Crow Haven. A blustery wind chattered around the village like a delinquent child, upturning dustbins and throwing their contents into the road. Geraldine strode along the Conduit Road until she came to the opening in the trees. Reaching the gate, she glanced up at the three praying figures. It looked to her as if they were trying to reach through the branches above them, like prisoners grasping at the free world through a barred window.

  She cleared the avenue. There were lights coming through the slit windows of the sealed room. She rang the bell.

  ‘Peter’s too ill to see you,’ Anne said, before she had fully opened the door.

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that. May I …?’

  ‘Annie? Who is it?’ The voice sounded anguished. A word she would never have thought of associating with Peter Malahyde.

  There was movement at the top of the spiral staircase.

  ‘Mrs Malahyde, I believe it would do Peter good to see Miss Pryce.’

  Brushing past Anne, Geraldine mounted the stairs and joined Father Brody on the first floor landing. He stood before a dark, heavy-looking door that was part-way open. The old priest looked greyer and frailer than she remembered.

  ‘How are you?’ she asked. ‘I heard you’ve been unwell.’

  ‘It was nothing,’ Brody whispered. ‘Miss Pryce, you must prepare yourself for a shock.’

  ‘Is he that ill?’

  ‘He’s dying.’

  ‘Dear God … I thought it was just psoriasis …’

  ‘It’s a degenerative tissue disease, that’s all they know. It’s not infectious, but he is wasting, Miss Pryce. He is quite … changed.’

  The staircase rattled as Anne Malahyde ascended.

  ‘Mrs Malahyde, please join us,’ Brody said. ‘Your husband needs …’

  A strange mix of fear and hatred twisted Anne Malahyde’s features. She disappeared into the main house without a word.

  ‘She won’t see him?’ Geraldine asked.

  ‘Nobody can convince her.’

  ‘But if he’s dying …’

  ‘You may sympathise with her a little more in a moment. She is only a child.’

  Brody opened the door.

  ‘Peter … Oh, sweet Jesus …’

  It took several seconds for the horror to subside. After the initial shock, waves of revulsion rolled through Geraldine Pryce, remoulding her insides into sickening shapes. At last, she mastered herself and walked to the bedside. She sat down and talked as soothingly as she could. A nurse circled the room, checking the expensive-looking machinery and, at intervals, applying lubricant to the corners of Peter’s eyes and lips.

  His skin, where it was not cracked, looked almost translucent. In those places where it had split apart, sores festered in patches of yolk-yellow. The rest of his face was a network of veins; broken blue lines which would burst if the slightest pressure was applied. Starved of blood, his lips had drawn back over his teeth, giving him a wolfish appearance. Geraldine took in his wasted form. She remembered, all those years ago, his body moving against hers. A virgin, she had panicked that his penis would tear her. Now she wondered whether it, too, had withered along with the stick-thin frame beneath the sheets.

  ‘Annie won’t come,’ he rasped. ‘But it’s a nice room, isn’t it?’

  The hurriedly prepared bedroom had that feeling of emptiness, while not actually being empty, that newly used rooms often possess. The adjustable bed, the drip-feed, the monitors and other equipment were all brand new. Ranged along the walls stood long, empty bookcases that looked like the only original features.

  ‘She’ll come,’ Geraldine said, touching his bandaged hand. ‘Give her time.’

  ‘She won’t. She’s probably got someone with her now. Some young buck between her thighs. A hot, juicy cock in her cunt … I have lots of visitors, though,’ his mouth bled as he smiled, but he seemed not to notice. ‘You and my doctors and Father Brody. And, just as I fall asleep, another visitor comes. He says he’s a doctor. He’s a great comfort … Father, you won’t believe this, but we used to be sweethearts, didn’t we, Gerry? Christ, she was a charity case, though. I used to have her climbing the fucking walls …’

  Brody suggested that they let Peter get some rest. When they reached the landing, he said: ‘You mustn’t take that to heart. He’s on a lot of different drugs …’

  ‘No, of course, I understand … Tell me, is it safe for him to be here?’

  ‘He is probably shortening his life by not being in hospital, but that’s his decision, and he’s lucid enough, most of the time.’

  ‘And what about her?’

  ‘She has no friends in the area,’ Brody said. ‘Perhaps on your next visit you might talk to her. Don’t pressurise her into seeing him, just listen to her fears.’

  ‘Do you think he’ll live to see his child?’ Geraldine asked.

  ‘Perhaps it would be better if he did not.’

  Geraldine tried to call often in the following weeks, but Peter had been away to London, and once to Denmark, for tests. The nurse, left behind at the house in case of a sudden return, had been given instructions that Anne did not wish to receive visitors. The young wife had not accompanied her husband, it seemed.

  On her eighth attempted visit, Geraldine thought that she must have missed Peter again. There appeared to be no lights on in the sickroom. It was only when she was within a few feet of the front door that she saw the windows had been bricked over. The house looked very odd now, one wing of it always watchful, while the other had had its eyes put out.

  She was let in by the nurse and taken straight upstairs. Anne was nowhere to be seen and Father Brody was also absent. The room was lit by a table lamp positioned a good distance from the bed.

  ‘I know Mrs Malahyde wouldn’t want you here,’ the nurse whispered, ‘but he needs some company.’

  ‘What happened to the windows?’ Geraldine asked.

  ‘He can’t bear any light on his skin. He wouldn’t have curtains. He insisted on the windows being bricked over. All on account of his imaginary friend. Oh, yes,’ the nurse said, noting Geraldine’s frown, ‘he’s always here apparently. Telling Mr Malahyde stories. His friend doesn’t mind the ugliness, Mr Malahyde tells us, being so ugly himself. But he prefers the dark. He doesn’t l
ike to visit if there’s a risk of light. Mr Malahyde’ll do anything for this new friend, and so …’

  The nurse swept her hand over the huge grey breeze blocks filling the windows. There was a kind a playful mockery in the young woman’s words that Geraldine didn’t care for. She decided to change the subject.

  ‘How did his tests go?’

  ‘Not well. They’re none the wiser. Closest they can guess is a strain of leprosy. It’s a complete cellular breakdown. Dr Stoker lives in the house now. He said that Mr Malahyde’s bones, organs, skin, they’re all losing cohesion, falling in on themselves.’

  ‘How is that possible?’

  The nurse shrugged.

  ‘And Mrs Malahyde?’

  ‘They tried to get her to sign something so they could remove him. You’d think she’d jump at the chance. I think she was too frightened. She knows she’s wrong not to visit him. Doesn’t want to add to her guilt by going against his wishes.’

  ‘Gurr-hee?’

  The voice croaked from the far end of the room.

  ‘Yes, it’s Miss Pryce come to see you.’ The nurse steered Geraldine by the elbow halfway down the sickroom. ‘Go ahead, I have to take a pee.’

  At first, Geraldine could not discern his features from the crisp, white bed sheets. A hand twitched on the counterpane. It was bandaged, but Peter’s fingers were exposed. The white sheen of bone shone through the skin. His face was heavily swathed and there were blotches of red throughout. On his head, only a few patches of hair remained. The colour seemed to have been bleached from these thin tufts, leaving them a weak straw-yellow.

  ‘Schee wchont caurrmm,’ he choked. ‘Maicchh hurr caurrmm.’

  ‘I can’t…’

  ‘Aychh’ll taychh schaa bay-bee. Chell hurr, aychh’ll taychh hurr bay-bee.’

  His black tongue, no larger than her little finger, flickered out as he spoke. In fact, his entire body appeared strangely reptilian. But it was his eyes, seen between the slits in the bandages, which really frightened her. When he blinked, his irises showed through the skin, as if his lids were as thin as tracing paper.