Richard Davis (ed) - [Year's Best Horror Stories 02]

by The Year's Best Horror Stories II (epub)

  "My niece," Ryder told him. "Sixteen. But I took her when she was only five, right after my sister died. Took her and raised her for eleven years. Raised her right, too. Let me tell you, that girl never lacked for anything. Whatever she wanted, whatever she needed, she got. The trips we took together-the good times we had-hell, I guess it sounds silly, but you'd be surprised what a kick you can get out of seeing a kid have fun. And smart? President of the junior class at Brixley-that's the name of the private school I put her in, best in town, half the stars sent their own daughters there. And that's what she was to me, just like my own flesh-and-blood daughter. So go figure it. How it happened I'll never know." Ryder blinked at the road ahead, forcing his eyes into focus.

  "How what happened?" Dave asked.

  "The hippies. The goddamn sons-a-bitching hippies."

  Dave noticed Ryder's eyes were suddenly alert amid the network of ugly wrinkles.

  "Don't ask me where she met the bastards," Ryder continued. "I thought I was guarding her from all that, but those lousy freaks are all over the place. She must've run into them through one of her friends at school-Christ knows, you see plenty of weirdos even in Bel Air. But you got to remember, she was just sixteen and how could she guess what she was getting into? I suppose at that age, an older guy with a beard and a Fender guitar and a souped-up cycle looks pretty exciting.

  "Anyhow, they got to her one night when I was away on location. Maybe she invited them over to the house, maybe they just showed up and she asked them in. Four of 'em, all stoned out of their skulls. Dude, that was the oldest one's name. He was like the leader and it was his idea from the start. Everybody knew that she never smoked grass or fooled around with drugs, so I guess he got the idea of pulling a fast one. Must have asked her to serve something to drink, and then he probably slipped the stuff into her glass. Enough to finish off a bull elephant, the coroner said."

  "You mean it killed her?"

  "Not right away. I wish to Christ it had." Ryder turned, his face working, and Dave had to strain to hear his voice through the rush of rain.

  "According to the coroner, she must have lived for at least an hour. Long enough for them to take turns-Dude and the three others. Long enough after that for them to get the idea.

  "They were in my den and I had the place all fixed up like a kind of trophy room-animal skins all over the wall, native drums, voodoo masks, stuff I'd picked up on my trips. And here were these four freaks, spaced out, and the kid, blowing her mind. One of the bastards took down a drum and started beating on it. Another got hold of a mask and started hopping around like a witch doctor. And Dude-it was Dude, all right, I know it for sure-he and the other creep pulled the lionskin off the wall and draped it over Melissa. Because this was a trip and they were playing Africa. Great White Hunter. Me Tarzan, you Jane.

  "By this time, Melissa couldn't even stand up anymore. Dude got her down on her hands and knees and she just wobbled there. And then-that dirty rotten son of a bitch- he pulled down the drapery cords and tied the lion skin over her head and shoulders. And he took a spear down from the wall, one of the Masai spears, and he was going to jab her in the ribs with it.

  "That's what I saw when I went in. Dude, the big stud, standing over Melissa with that spear.

  "He didn't stand long. One look at me and the fun was over. I think he threw the spear before he ran, but I can't remember. I can't remember anything about the next couple of minutes. They said I broke one freak's collarbone and the creep in the mask had a concussion from where his head hit the wall, Tne third one was almost dead by me time the squad arrived and pried my fingers loose from his neck. As it was, they were too late to save him.

  "And they were too late for Melissa. She just lay there under that dirty lion skin-that's the part I do remember, the part I wish I could forget-"

  "You killed a kid?' Dave said.

  Ryder shook his head. "I killed an animal. That's what I told them at the trial. When an animal goes vicious, you got a right. The judge said one to five, but I was out in a little over two years." He glanced at Dave. "Ever been inside?"

  "No. How is it-rough?"

  "You can say that again. Rough as a cob." Ryder's stomach rumbled. "I went in pretty feisty, so they put me down in solitary for a while and that didn't help. You sit there in the dark and you start thinking. Here am I, used to traveling all over the world, penned up in a little cage like an animal. And one of those animals who killed Melissa is running free. One was dead, of course, and the two others I tangled with had maybe learned their lesson. But the big one, the one who started it all, he was loose. Cops never did catch up with him and they weren't about to waste any more time trying, now that the trial was over.

  "I thought a lot about Dude. That was the big one's name, or did I tell you?" Ryder's head swayed with the movement of the cab and, in the dim light, he seemed well on his way to being smashed. But his driving was still steady and Dave could keep him awake if he could keep him talking.

  "So, what happened?" Dave asked.

  "Mostly, I thought about what I was going to do to Dude once I got out. Finding him would be tricky, but I knew I could do it-hell, I spent years in Africa, tracking animals. And I intended to hunt this one down."

  "Then it's true about you being an explorer?" Dave asked.

  "Animal trapper," Ryder said. "Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria -this was before Hollywood-and I saw it all. Things these young punks today never dreamed of. Why, they were dancing and drumming and drugging over there before the first hippie crawled out from under his rock, and let me tell you, they know how to do this stuff for real.

  "Like when this Dude tied the lion-skin on Melissa, he was just freaked out, playing games. He should have seen what some of those witch doctors can do.

  "First, they steal themselves a girl, sometimes a young boy, but let's say a girl because of Melissa. And they shut her up in a cave-a cave with a low ceiling, so she can't stand up, has to go on all fours. They put her on drugs right away, heavy doses, enough to keep her out for a long time. And when she wakes up, her hands and feet have been operated on, so they can be fitted with claws. Lion claws. And they've sewed her into a lionskin. Not just put it over her-it's sewed on completely and it can't be removed.

  "You just think about what it's like. She's inside this lionskin, shut away in a cave, doped up, doesn't know where she is or what's going on. And they keep her that way. Feed her nothing but raw meat. She's all alone in the dark, smelling that damn lion smell, nobody talking to her and nobody for her to talk to. Then pretty soon they come in and break some bones in her throat, her larynx, and all she can do is whine and growl. Whine and growl and move around on all fours.

  "You know what happens, boy? You know what happens to someone like that? They go crazy. And after a while, they get to believing they really are a lion. The next step is for the witch doctor to take them out and train them to kill, but that's another story."

  Dave glanced up quickly. "You're putting me on."

  "It's all there in the government reports. Maybe the jets go into Nairobi airport now, but back in the bush, things haven't changed. Like I say, some of these people know more about drugs than any hippie ever will. Especially a stupid animal like Dude."

  "What happened after you got out?" Dave said. "Did you ever catch up with him?"

  Ryder shook his head.

  "But I thought you said you had it all planned."

  "Fella gets a lot of weird ideas in solitary. In a way it's pretty much like being shut up in one of those caves. Come to think of it, that's what first reminded me-"

  "Of what?"

  "Nothing." Ryder gestured hastily. "Forget it. That's what I did. When I got out, I figured that was the best way. Forgive and forget."

  "You didn't even try to find Dude?"

  Ryder frowned. "I told you, I had other things to think about. Like being washed up in the business, losing the house, the furniture, everything. Also, I had a drinking problem. But you don't want to hear about
that. Anyway, I ended up with the carny and there's nothing more to tell."

  Lightning streaked across the sky and thunder rolled in its wake. Dave turned his head, glancing back through the wire-meshed window. The gorilla was still hunched at the far end, peering through the bars into the night beyond. Dave stared at him for a long moment, not really wanting to stop, because then he knew he'd have to ask the question.

  9: J. Ramsey Campbell - Napier Court

  Alma Napier sat up in bed. Five minutes ago she'd laid down Victimes de Devoir to cough, then stared round her bedroom heavy-eyed; the partly-open door reflected panels of cold October sunlight, which glanced from the flowered wallpaper, glared from the glass-fronted bookcase, but left the metronome on top in shadow and failed to reach the corner where her music-stand was standing. She'd thought she had heard footsteps on the stairs. Beyond the brilliant panel she could see the darker landing; she waited for someone to appear. Her clock, displayed within its glass tube, showed 11.03. It must be Maureen. Then she thought: could it be her parents? Had they decided to give up their holiday after all? She had looked forward to being left alone for a fortnight when her cold had confined her to the house; she wanted time to prove herself, to make her own way- she felt a stab of misery as she listened. Couldn't they leave her alone for two weeks? Didn't they trust her? The silence thickened; the darkness on the landing seemed to move. "Who's there? Is that you, Maureen?" she called and coughed. The darkness moved again. Of course it didn't, she said, willing her hands to unclench. She held up one; the little finger twitched. Don't be childish, she told herself, where's your strength? She slid out of the cocoon of warmth, slipped on her slippers and dressing-gown, and went downstairs.

  The house was empty. "You see?" she said aloud, What else had she expected? She entered the kitchen. On the window-sill sat the medicine her mother had bought. "I don't like to leave you alone," she'd said two hours ago. "Promise you'll take this and stay in bed until you're better. I've asked Maureen to buy anything you need while she's shopping." "Mother," Alma had protested, "I could have asked her. After all, she is my friend." "I know I'm being over-protective. I know I can't expect to be liked for it any more" -and oh God, Alma thought, all the strain of calming her down, of parting friends; there was no longer any question of love. As her mother was leaving the bedroom while her father bumped the last case down to the car, she'd said: "Alma, I don't want to talk about Peter as you well know, but you did promise"-"I told you." Alma had replied somewhat sharply, "I shan't be seeing him again." That was all over. She wished everything was over, all this possessiveness which threatened to erase her completely; she wished she could be left alone with her music. But that was not to be, not for two years. There was the medicine-bottle, implying her mother's continued influence in the house. Taking medicine for a cold was a sign of weakness, in Alma's opinion. But her chest hurt terribly when she coughed; after all, her mother wasn't imposing it on her, if she took it, that was her own decision. She measured a spoonful and gulped it down. Then she padded determinedly through the hall, past the living-room (her father's desk reflected in one mirror), the diningroom (her mother's flower arrangements preserved under glass in another), and upstairs, past her mother's Victorian valentines framed above the ornate banister. Now, she ordered herself, to bed, and another chapter of Victimes de Devoir before Maureen arrived. She'd never make the Brichester French Circle if she carried on like this.

  But as soon as she climbed into bed, trying to preserve its bag of warmth, she was troubled by something she remembered having seen. In the hall-what had been wrong? She caught it: as she'd mounted the stairs she'd seen a shape in the hall mirror. Maureen's coat hanging on the coat-stand- but Maureen wasn't here. Certainly something pale had stood against the front-door panes. About to investigate, she addressed herself: the house was empty, there could be nothing there. All right, she'd asked Maureen to check the story of the house in the library's files of the Brichester Herald-but that didn't mean she believed the hints she'd heard in the corner shop that day before her mother had intervened with "Now, Alma, don't upset yourself" and to the shopkeeper: "Haunted, indeed! I'm afraid we grew out of that sort of thing in Severnford!" If she had seemed to glimpse a figure in the hall it merely meant she was delirious. She'd asked Maureen to check purely because she wanted to face up to the house, to come to terms with it. She was determined to stop thinking of her room as her refuge, where she was protected by her music. Before she left the house she wanted to make it a step toward maturity.

  The darkness shifted on the landing. Tired eyes, she explained-yet again her room enfolded her. She reached out and removed her flute from its case; she admired its length, its shine, the perfection of its measurements as they fitted to her fingers. She couldn't play it now-each time she tried she coughed-but it seemed charged with beauty. Her appreciation over, she laid the instrument to rest in its long black box.

  "You retreat into your room and your music." Peter had said that, but he'd been speaking of a retreat from Hiroshima, from the conditions in Lower Brichester, from all the horrid things he'd insisted she confront. That was over, she said quickly, and the house was empty. Yet her eyes strayed from Victimes de Devoir.

  Footsteps on the stairs again. This time she recognized Maureen's. The others-which she hadn't heard, of course -had been indeterminate, even sexless. She thought she'd ask Maureen whether she'd left her coat in the hall; she might have entered while Alma had slept, with the key she'd borrowed. The door opened and the panel of sunlight fled, darkening the room. No, thought Alma; to enquire into possible delusions would be an admission of weakness.

  Maureen dropped her carrier and sneezed. "I think I've got your cold," she said indistinctly.

  "Oh dear." Alma's mood had darkened with the room, with her decision not to speak. She searched for conversation in which to lose herself. "Have you heard yet when you're going to library school?" she asked.

  "It's not settled yet. I don't know, the idea of a spinster career is beginning to depress me. I'm glad you're not faced with that."

  "You shouldn't brood," Alma advised, restlessly stacking her books on the bedspread.

  Maureen examined the titles. "Victimes de Devoir, The-rese Desqueyroux. In the original French, good Lord. Why are you grappling with these?"

  "So that I'll be an interesting young woman," Alma replied instantly. "I'm sure I've told you I feel guilty doing nothing. I can't practice, not with this cold. I only hope it's past before the Camside concert. Which reminds me, do you think I could borrow your transistor during the day? For the music programme. To give me peace."

  "All right. I can't today, I start work at once. Though I think-no, it doesn't matter."

  "Go on."

  "Well, I agree with Peter, you know that. You can't have peace and beauty without closing your eyes to the world. Didn't he say that to seek peace in music was to seek complete absence of sensation, of awareness?"

  "He said that and you know my answer." Alma unwillingly remembered; he had been here in her room, taking in the music in the bookcase, the polished gramophone-she'd sensed his disapproval and felt miserable; why couldn't he stay the strong forthright man she'd come to admire and love? "Really, darling, this is an immature attitude," he'd said. "I can't help feeling you want to abdicate from the human race and its suffering." Her eyes embraced the room. This was security, apart from the external chaos, the horrid part of life. "Even you appreciate the beauty of the museum exhibits," she told Maureen.

  "I suppose that's why you work there. I admire them, yes, but in many cases by ignoring their history of cruelty."

  "Why must you and Peter always look for the horrid things? What about this house? There are beautiful things here. That gramophone-you can look at it and imagine all the craftsmanship it took. Doesn't that seem to you fulfilling?"

  "You know we leftists have a functional aesthetic. Anyway-" Maureen paused. "If that's your view of the house you'd best not know what I found out about it."


  "Go on, I want to hear."

  "If you insist. The Brichester Herald was useless-they reported the death of the owner and that was all-but I came across a chapter in Pamela Jones' book on local hauntings which gives the details. The last owner of the house lost a fortune on the stock market-I don't know how exactly, of course it's not my field-and he became a recluse in this house. There's worse to come, are you sure you want-? Well, he went mad. Things started disappearing, so he said, and he accused something he thought was living in the house, something that used to stand behind him or mock him from the empty rooms. I can imagine how he started having hallucinations, looking at this view-"

  Alma joined her at the window. "Why?" she disagreed. "I think it's beautiful." She admired the court before the house, the stone pillars framing the iron flourish of the gates; then a stooped woman passed across the picture, heaving a pram from which overflowed a huge cloth bag of washing. Alma felt depressed again; the scene was spoilt.

  "Sorry, Alma," Maureen said; her cold hand touched Alma's fingers. Alma frowned slightly and insinuated herself between the sheets. "… Sorry," Maureen said again. "Do you want to hear the rest? It's conventional, really. He gassed himself. The Jones book has something about a note he wrote - insane, of course: he said he wanted to 'fade into the house, the one possession left to me', whatever that meant. Afterward the stories started; people used to see someone very tall and thin standing at the front door on moonlit nights, and one man saw a figure at an upstairs window with its head turning back and forth like clockwork. Yes, and one of the neighbours used to dream that the house was 'screaming for help'-the book explained that, but not to me I'm afraid. I shouldn't be telling you all this, you'll be alone until tonight."

  "Don't worry, Maureen. It's just enjoyably creepy."

  "A perceptive comment. It blinds you to what really happened. To think of him in this house, possessing the rooms, eating, sleeping-you forget he lived once, he was real. I wonder which room-?"