by Matt Drabble
The longer his haunting went on, the less he was able to sleep and soon he was barely functioning and his behavior was becoming increasingly erratic. It began to affect his work when he saw the red haired man at a dinner hosted for the Ministry of Defense. There was a fat juicy contract up for grabs and Donald was wheeled out for decretive dressing. He had been talking to a fat minister who had a love of military history and no real desire for service when he had seen him. The red haired man had been wearing a waiter’s uniform and serving canapés. Donald had lost it completely and charged across the dining room chasing the running server. He had caught the man for the first time and accosted the waiter, coarsely swearing and pummeling the man, more through fear than anger. He had been mortified to see that the cowering man beneath him was a trembling teen with blonde hair not red. He had been so sure that the red haired man was stalking him again, only to realise that he was seeing Hoffman’s face everywhere it would seem. He was able to hang onto his privileged position only by the skin of his teeth, and by allowing his actions to be deemed post-traumatic stress disorder.
At the suggestion of his employers he decided to take a holiday, perhaps a change of scenery would clear his increasingly troubled mind. He rented a deserted cottage in the wilds of North East England. It still was out of season and the area was quiet. Tourists had yet to brave the chilly North and Donald was looking forward to the solitude. He selected a small cottage mainly for its unencumbered immediate surroundings. The photo of the place showed that it was located in a large open expanse of fields; no encasing trees or thickets of woodland. No cover when approaching the cottage on any side, and no way for anyone to be able to creep up undetected.
Donald left his city dwelling behind and headed for the isolation and rest that he and his mind desperately craved. The roads started as major motorways, before morphing into A roads, drifting into B roads, and finally becoming a single track that wound its way through a picturesque countryside. Donald felt his mood lift as he left the madness of uncertainty far behind. Whether or not the red haired man was Hoffman - real or otherwise - or even if he was just a figment of Donald’s guilty conscience, Donald needed some peace. His thoughts were taut like piano wire. He had barely slept or eaten in weeks and his life had become merely a hollow existence. The night before he had left for his break, he had woken up at three in the morning. The gentle moonlight was cascading through his bedroom window and somehow, he just knew that he had to look outside. He lived in a plush apartment on a swanky street of high end homes. The terraced buildings were curved around in a circle, high above the city’s bright lights. On the pavement opposite his building was a streetlight that shone powerfully, using city resources to power a burglary deterrent at the tax payer’s expense. The streetlights were immaculately maintained and always in perfect working order. Donald had awoken without the comforting illumination framing his expensive home. He had crept to the window knowing just what he was going to find, and not being disappointed. The red haired man stood leaning motionless against the streetlight and obscured under the dead bulb. His silhouette was casual and only the bright moonlight glinted off of his bright red hair. Donald had stood transfixed at the window for almost an hour. He wanted to open the window and scream at the man. He wanted to demand answers, to hurl insults, but he could only stare back. He had toyed with the idea of going to the police, but the red haired man had never spoken to him, never threatened him, and never even approached him. And after all, Donald was supposed to be a war hero, decorated on the battlefield and was now terrified by a man who had merely looked at him.
He finally arrived at the cottage. The small coastal village of Ermsby was the closest population centre to him, and that was seven miles away. The single story cottage was chocolate box perfect; stone walls with climbing ivy and a thatched roof. A delicate path wound its way through a perfect garden framed with pretty flowers all standing to attention. The day was fast passing into evening as he pulled up and the expansive view ran down over the open fields to the ocean in the distance. The rolling fog was drifting inwards and Donald shuddered as the fog reminded him of the fateful night when he had fled and left his men to die.
He shook away the morbid thoughts and hefted his bags from the boot of the car. He had packed lightly but with heavy attire. The most important item of course was his trusty Browning 9mm that he had kept from his service days, and he never travelled anywhere without it. He knew that if he was caught and searched he would be in trouble despite his former occupation, but he also knew that he couldn’t take the risk of not carrying it.
He reached the cottage front door and used the key that had been posted to him by the rental company. He stepped inside the front door and reached for the light switch. His stomach rolled over with bile when the lights didn’t work. He desperately flipped the switch over and over again to no avail, and he stood in the doorway not wanting to enter the house. He quickly dropped his bags and reached in to the smallest one retrieving the Browning. He backed away from the doorway and out into the night. The gun was held in front of him with both hands pulled in towards his chest in a classic stance. He swung the weapon around as he checked the surroundings; there was no red haired man to be seen. He relaxed a little and reached into his jacket and pulled out his mobile phone. He scanned the menu for the rental company’s number and pressed send. All the while he kept one eye flicking around and keeping watch. The phone rang and rang without answer. He was about to hang it up when a harassed voice finally answered.
“Blackwater Rentals,” the women’s voice spoke with irritation.
“This is Donald Carragher, I have a cottage booked through you, only there seems to be a little lack of electricity,” Donald snapped.
“Hang on a minute,” the woman’s voice was accompanied by rustling papers. “Here we are, Mr. Carragher, oh…”
“Oh, what?” Donald barked.
“Apparently you’re not booked in until tomorrow sir, the 19th.”
“Yes the 19th, that’s today I think you’ll find.” Donald said snippily.
“Sorry Mr. Carragher, but today’s the 18th.”
Donald opened his mouth to give the girl a piece of his mind when he suddenly realised that she was right, it was the 18th. “Oh dear,” was all he could manage. “What about the electricity?”
“It comes on after midnight tonight Mr. Carragher, I would get the supply switched on but it’s too late for tonight.”
“Well, that will have to do then.” Donald said managing to sound magnanimous even though he was actually in the wrong and now feeling pretty stupid.
He hung up the phone and put the gun away. His senses were racing and his hands were trembling and all because apparently he couldn’t read a calendar. Disgusted with himself he snatched his bags up again and stormed into the house, refusing to be intimidated by an empty house.
The cottage was cold and felt damp as though unused for some time. Donald dumped his bags and headed for the kitchen to turn on the central heating, before remembering that there was no power. He grumpily stomped back into the lounge area, thankfully there was a fire laid in the fireplace. He lit the twisted paper under the kindling quickly and stood back as the flames licked around the wood and slowly started to warm the room. Donald figured that he could spend a night in front of a warm fireplace and wait for the power to come on tomorrow. He grabbed a candle from the mantelpiece and lit it with the dancing flames. He then used the lit candle to light the others dotted around the room, and soon the lounge was flickering with subtle light. Donald sat down in front of the now roaring fire and placed a couple of logs on it that were stacked neatly to the side. He held his hands up to the flames and was grateful for the heat as it coursed through his chilled body. He was feeling relaxed and sleepy for the first time in what seemed like forever. His eyes drooped as sleep drifted towards him. The cottage was deathly silent and only the fitful wind outside provided any soundtrack.
The night suddenly exploded into life as the
shattering crash of glass was swiftly followed by the ear piercing wail of his car alarm. Donald snatched out the Browning and charged to the front door. He almost reached it before his natural instincts took over and he skidded to a halt. He began backing away from the now open front door. The yellow flashing lights of his car illuminated the black night as they danced in tune with the alarm. A window at the rear of the house suddenly smashed, Donald span around with the shaking gun out in front of him.
“Major,” a chilling voice called out in the night. “Help me Major,” the voice spoke weakly and in great pain. “Please Major, I’m hurt bad, please help me.”
“Who are you?” Donald screamed.
“I need your help Major, I’m in so much pain, so much pain,” the voice cried.
“What do you want from me?” Donald sobbed.
“I want you to show me what a hero you are Major, you are a hero aren’t you? I mean you’ve got that medal to prove it right?” The voice laughed. “Show me, SHOW ME WHAT A HERO YOU ARE!”
Donald fired the pistol into the rear of the house at where the voice seemed to be coming from.
“Hahahahahaha,” the voice cackled, “Do you really think that you can hurt me Hummingbird? I’ve been shot before, didn’t trouble me none.”
“Leave me alone, LEAVE ME ALONE!” Donald screamed as he fired a few more rounds into the darkness.
“Hummingbird, Hummingbird,” the voice sang, now from nearer the front of the house.
Donald collapsed to his knees, mentally and physically exhausted, “Hoffman?” He whispered, “Leave me alone,” he whimpered, “Just leave me alone.”
“Oh, I’m not done with you yet Hummingbird, not by a long stretch.”
“What do you want?” Donald begged as a dark figure moved into the doorway.
“I want you to tell everyone the truth about that night. I want the world to know just what a real hero you are,” the voice laughed. “You may have got all those other fools believing your lies, but not me Hummingbird, not me.”
“What are you?” Donald pleaded, “Are you alive? Are you dead? Is this my punishment?”
Hoffman stood rock still and only radiated hatred. “I am more than you could ever imagine.”
Donald looked up at the shadow. The figure was framed by the flashing light of the car alarm behind, and the only thing visible was a shock of bright red hair. Donald raised the Browning, praying that he hadn’t emptied the clip.
“You going to shoot me Hummingbird, again?” Hoffman laughed, “I don’t believe that you have the stones for it my boy, not when you are looking into the eyes of the enemy, not when you have to look upon my face.”
Donald closed his eyes and pulled the trigger, the explosion was deafening in the enclosed space. He pulled and pulled until the hammer snapped down on an empty clip. The acidic stench of gunfire filled his nostrils and clung nauseatingly to the back of his throat. Unbelievably Hoffman was now a collapsed shadow lying in the dirt outside of the cottage. Donald stood unsteadily on trembling legs and moved closer to him.
The figure was lying choking with a wet rasp on the path outside. Donald could see three bloody holes punched through Hoffman’s bulky overcoat. This was the closest that he had ever stood next to the figure that had haunted him for the past few weeks. He could suddenly see that the figure was actually smaller than Hoffman had been, shorter and not as broad. He knelt to the dying man and looked closely into his face; whilst there was a strong resemblance, it wasn’t Hoffman.
“Who are you?” Donald snarled; his anger and courage rose now that he was facing a real and incapacitated man.
The man coughed violently and sprayed a fine red mist into the air, “Hoffman,” he managed.
“Bullshit. Hoffman is dead, he died a coward.”
“I’m Captain Thomas Hoffman, Sergeant Robert Hoffman was my brother, and he was no coward.”
“And you think that I’m in some way responsible for your brother’s death?” Donald strived for an air of incredulity.
“I don’t think, I know. I am a doctor my dear Major and when they launched the recovery mission for my brother’s body I went with them,” he coughed again with a dangerously wheezing chest. “I found my brother in amongst the carnage, I brought him back in secret pulling in every favor that I had built up over twenty years in the forces. It was me that carried out the autopsy. He had suffered multiple stab wounds and other assorted abrasions, but he had actually died from gunshot wounds. The only thing was that the weapon used was a Browning 9mm, much like the one that you use.”
Donald stared down at the dying man. He thought back to that night in the ravine. He thought of the hand coming out of the darkness and grabbing him. He thought of his panic and of his firing blindly into the darkness and hearing the body fall and his heart sank. Not only had he left his men to die, he had actually killed one of them himself. His thoughts were interrupted by the sounds of wailing sirens rapidly approaching.
“Ah, that will be the police I’ll wager,” Dr Hoffman managed, “I made sure to arrange a little appointment for you, regardless of how this evening played out. I assumed that you would break at some point, we can only hide our true natures for so long Major and your yellow streak is a mile long.”
Donald’s mind raced as his powerful sense of self-preservation struggled for an answer to his predicament. He looked down at the quickly fading doctor, “Wait a minute, you’ll be gone before they get here doc,” he said suddenly smirking, “I can tell them anything that I like.”
“Unless I’ve left a letter waiting to be discovered along with an autopsy report,” Dr Hoffman struggled to say.
I can tell them that you have been harassing me for weeks, blaming me unjustly for the death of your brother, driven mad by grief,” Donald laughed. “I’ve got a bloody Victoria Cross medal, I’m a damn hero, and you’ve got no evidence.”
“Is that right?” Dr Hoffman said, quietly fading.
“Yes it is.” Donald said gleefully. “You may have an autopsy report but nothing to match the bullets to. All I have to do is chuck my Browning away at some point. It’ll be a shame as I do love this gun, it was a present,” he said turning the Browning over in his hands.
“You’ve forgotten something,” Dr Hoffman whispered, “I’ve now got three bullets in my chest that will match my brother’s, and even if you get rid of the gun it will still be registered on file as having belonged to you. My letter exactly details my conclusions, and what exactly are the odds of two brothers dying from the same gun and you being present at both scenes?”
Donald’s expression turned from triumph to horror as the police car skidded to halt in front of him and Dr Hoffman died with a smile on his face.
23.
BLACKWATER HEIGHTS
“I’ve got to ask.” Martin said when they were safely outside of the Major’s room.
“How come Major Carragher there isn’t in a real prison?” Jimmy chuckled.
“Exactly.”
“Well, when you’ve got as much pull as Donald’s father, coupled with the establishment’s embarrassment at having awarded a Victoria Cross Medal to a murderer, it all adds up to a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder. The Major is tucked safely away for his own protection and that of others.”
“Didn’t Major Carragher object to being branded a nut and being shut away?” Martin asked in amazement.
“Consider the alternative; a very public trial, facing his peers, humiliation, dragged before the world painted as a coward and a killer. No, no, no, Major Carragher was more than happy to slink away from the limelight in a much more discreet disgrace.”
“Well how long can they keep some of these people in here? I mean surely some of them have to get out at some point?” Martin asked, feeling the claustrophobia of the hospital walls closing in around him.
“Oh I think that we are pretty well stocked for now.” Jimmy said with a neutral smile, “But there’s always room for one more.”
“Yo
u know Jimmy, you can be a pretty creepy dude sometimes.” Martin spoke lightly but his joviality fell some way short as Jimmy turned to face him.
“Oh Martin, you have no idea,” Jimmy said as he opened the penultimate door.
24.
DISH OF THE DAY
Zachery Carmine pushed his chair back away from the computer and rubbed his tired eyes. The text on the screen reeked of bitter bile and it was just the way he liked it.
Zachery was forty three; he was around six feet tall, slim, and toned. His hair was a side parted silver sweep that spoke of careful control and grooming. His features were delicate with silvery grey eyes and a smooth hairless facial profile.
Zachery was a food critic for The Globe newspaper, and he wrote a column entitled “What the Fork!” The column was originally intended to be a serious critique of the city’s restaurants and eateries, but Zachery had soon found his niche as a catty barbed reviewer whose readers devoured his insults more hungrily than his considered appraisals. Very wisely as it turned out, Zachery had written his articles without a sidebar image of himself and under the pen name of Ezra Geeks. It had now got to the point where he would no longer be welcomed at any of the city’s establishments, as his pen name at least was now mud. He knew that he had exacting standards that would never be met. His was a palate designed for manna from heaven and his quest was always one of never ending perfection.