Scared to Death--Ten Sinister Stories by the Master of the Macabre
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Her mother’s hair.
She couldn’t speak. She could barely walk. As if in a dream, she drifted into the room where her parents were still talking. She realized now that they were arguing in low, insistent voices.
She stopped in the doorway. A woman with a partly bald skull was standing with her back to her. It was Samantha. She was still in her nightgown.
Derek was facing her, dressed in silk pyjamas and slippers.
“We have to…” he was saying.
“We can’t.”
“We don’t have a choice!”
Derek saw Cecily come in and stopped.
“Mummy…?” Cecily quavered,
Samantha turned around. She looked very pale. Something red was trickling out of her nose.
“What’s happened?” Cecily asked. But she knew what had happened. She remembered what Obadiah Harris had told them.
“Once you get the disease, you just begin to rot away, one piece at a time, and there’s nothing anyone can do.”
Once you get the disease…
“I’m sorry, Cecily,” Derek said and a single tear rolled down his cheek. Except that Cecily saw it wasn’t a tear. It was his whole eye. “Go and get dressed and finish packing your bags,” he continued. “We’re going to take the J train.”
A NOTE FROM THE CHAIRMAN OF WALKER BOOKS
MY NAME IS DAVID LLOYD and it has been my privilege to be the Chairman of Walker Books for many years now. Although you may not know it, Walker is actually an independent company and specializes exclusively in books for young people. During my time here, my favourite titles have included the quite delightful stories of Maisy the mouse, We’re Going on a Bear Hunt (which I have read a hundred times … it always makes me smile) and, of course, Where’s Wally?, which has become an international sensation.
I do not like horror stories.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not some old fuddy-duddy who wants to protect children from the darker things in life. Nor do I mind violence (in moderation) in children’s books. But I do sometimes think that writers can go too far and that there’s really no point in producing a collection of stories that is going to give its readers horrible nightmares. At the end of the day, I am in charge of this company – and when mothers or teachers complain, I’m at the receiving end. In fact, for many years it was the policy at Walker Books not to publish horror stories at all.
After all, we’ve sold millions of copies of brightly coloured picture books featuring flowers, fairies and children having fun and nothing horrible has ever happened in any of them. At the end of the day, I have to ask myself, who needs bloodshed and violence in the library when there is already so much of it out on the street?
So I was very concerned when Anthony Horowitz offered us a collection of horror stories.We had already turned down two other collections of horror stories, which were later published by someone else and are still in print today. I can’t help but notice that J. K. Rowling has never found it necessary to indulge in this type of material – although, very sadly, we don’t publish her.
But this time I had a problem.
Like it or not, Anthony has had a certain amount of success with his Alex Rider books, which are published by us. In fact, to be honest, our new, very smart reception area was entirely paid for with the proceeds from Snakehead alone. This has always been the problem with writers and publishers. At the beginning, before authors are well known, they’re very easy to handle. They do what you tell them. But as they become more successful, they often become more demanding. We worry about offending them. Because the sad truth is that our profits depend on them.
Now, I’m not saying that Anthony has become big-headed or anything like that. But the point is, I was worried about upsetting him. At the same time, I was very reluctant to publish the collection that you now hold in your hand.
So why, you are asking, did I go ahead?
Well, after I’d read the manuscript I called Anthony’s new editor, Jane Millitrant, into my office. Jane had only been with Walker for a few months after a very successful career with another publisher where one of the books she edited, The Owl Magnet, set in Belfast during the Troubles and featuring a disabled owl, deservedly won the Carnegie Award. She had also read the horror stories.
“What did you think of them?” I asked.
“I hated them,” she said, with a shudder. “That one about the boy who was electrocuted in a field. Or that poor little girl who was eaten alive! I don’t know how anybody could think these things up.”
“I agree,” I said. “But what do you think we should do?”
Jane strummed her fingers nervously on my desk. She had very long fingers. In fact, she was an exceptionally tall woman with straight black hair that fell almost to her waist. She was married to the well-known food critic, Jasper Millitrant. The two of them had no children of their own. “I suppose we have no real choice,” she muttered at length. “If we don’t publish them somebody else probably will, and we’ll not only lose the profit, we’ll upset Anthony. But I really don’t think we can let them go ahead as they are. We’re going to have to make some cuts.”
“What cuts do you think are needed?” I asked.
“I have them here.” Jane opened her smart leather handbag and took out a sheet of paper. She unfolded it and set it in front of her. “There are seven cuts I have in mind,” she went on. “These bits really are just too violent and too unpleasant. They’ll have to go.”
“May I see?”
She turned the piece of paper round and this is what I read:
— BET YOUR LIFE: All the deaths in this horrible story are dwelt on in far too much detail. I think we need to cut the machine-gunning of Raife Plant and also the electrocution of Richard Verdi. Both made me feel sick!
— YOU HAVE ARRIVED: The severed limb on page 61 is almost certain to give young readers nightmares. The story will work just as well without it.
— THE COBRA: Charles wetting the bed on page 79. This is very distasteful. Is it really necessary?
— ARE YOU SITTING COMFORTABLY?: Description of Dennis Taylor’s eyeball exploding. This strikes me as highly unlikely and quite disgusting. Suggest we remove.
— POWER: Another electrocution, again described in far too much detail. We can certainly make a cut here. And why do we have to mention Craig losing his underpants on page 236? Completely out of place in a children’s book!
I counted up the number of cuts that Jane was demanding. There were seven of them, just as she had said. I thought for a moment. “If we were able to persuade Anthony to make these cuts,” I asked, “do you think we would be able to publish the book?”
Jane paused before speaking. I could see that she was unwilling to answer my question. “I suppose we could slip it out without anyone noticing,” she admitted at length. “Perhaps if we published it just after an Alex Rider book … without advertising it or anything.”
“But what if he refuses to make the cuts?”
“Then I think we’d be putting our reputation on the line. Honestly, David, I think it would be a mistake.”
It was almost lunchtime. At Walker Books we have a rather delightful tradition. We all have lunch in the same canteen, down on the bottom floor, although, due to a strange design fault in the building, we have to go upstairs to get there. But today I had very little appetite. I thought I might walk down to the pub instead.
“Well, you’ll have to go and talk to him,” I decided.
Jane went pale – and she hadn’t been what I would call deeply coloured to begin with. “I really would rather not,” she said.
“Why is that?”
“Well … I know this is a dreadful thing to say. But…”
“Come on, Jane! Spit it out!” I didn’t know whether to be annoyed or concerned.
“It’s just that Anthony worries me. If you really want the truth, David, I sometimes wonder if he’s all right in the head!”
This was news to me. I sat back in my chair, as
tonished.
Jane went on. “He sits on his own all day in that flat in Farringdon. For what it’s worth, it looks out over a crematorium. He has a human skull on his desk. He was given it when he was a boy. And there’s a horrible spider in a glass case too. I know he can be very pleasant when he wants to be, but sometimes I look into his eyes and I see something strange.” She took a deep breath. “Be honest. You’ve read these stories. Don’t you think you’d have to be a little bit disturbed to write something like that?”
“Lots of authors write horror stories,” I responded. “Look at Stephen King. And Darren Shan for that matter. Are you saying they’re all barking mad?”
“No. I’m just saying they have a dark side, and with some of them you can’t be sure where that dark side will lead them.”
This was going nowhere. I decided to draw the meeting to a close. “Listen, Jane,” I said. “All we’re doing is asking Anthony to make seven cuts in a book that will be more than two hundred pages long. I can’t see that he’ll complain. I’m sure he’ll be delighted that we’re publishing the book at all. Particularly after we turned down the last two horror books.”
“He’s very precious about his work, David. You don’t know him the way I do. His books are full of death. And you haven’t spent hours with him, arguing…”
“Just see him and let me know how you get on.” I got up and opened the door for her. “If there’s any problem, we can think again.”
Jane Millitrant went to see Anthony the following Tuesday. Her meeting was at 2.30 p.m.
She did not come in for work the next day.
The first I knew that something was wrong was when I got a telephone call from her husband, Jasper. Jane hadn’t been home for forty-eight hours. Her parents (a charming couple with a home in Bridgwater) hadn’t heard from her. Jasper had reported her as a missing person to the police.
I’m not quite sure what I thought about this. Editors, even the best ones, can be highly strung people and I wondered if Jane hadn’t simply taken herself off somewhere for a few days’ rest. The last time I had seen her she had, after all, been in a state of nervous excitement. The police actually came round to Walker Books. I spoke to a nice Detective Superintendent and I was relieved that he didn’t seem to be too worried. He was sure that Jane would turn up.
She did, two days later. Floating face down in the River Thames.
It seemed that she had been attacked by a maniac. The killer had taken a knife to her. She had been stabbed repeatedly and then thrown off Waterloo Bridge. I saw the headlines in the Evening Standard that night as, dazed and distressed, I made my way home:
CHILDREN’S EDITOR RECEIVES SEVEN CUTS
Seven cuts.
I’m sure it was just a coincidence. I mean, I wouldn’t suggest that a bestselling author would descend into madness and murder to defend his work. Absolutely not. And I can promise you that Jane’s unfortunate death played absolutely no part in my decision.
But in the end, I went ahead. I decided to let the stories go ahead exactly as Anthony had written them. I didn’t want to upset him – that’s all. Perfectly understandable.
I just hope you enjoyed them more than I did. Since the publication of this book, David Lloyd has resigned as the chairman of Walker Books for reasons not unrelated to this story…
Anthony Horowitz is the author of the number one bestselling Alex Rider books and the Power of Five series. He enjoys huge international acclaim as a writer for both children and adults. After the success of his first James Bond novel, Trigger Mortis, he was invited back by the Ian Fleming Estate to write a second, Forever and a Day. His latest crime novel, The Word is Murder, introducing Detective Daniel Hawthorne, was a bestseller. Anthony has won numerous awards, including the Bookseller Association/Nielsen Author of the Year Award, the Children’s Book of the Year Award at the British Book Awards, and the Red House Children’s Book Award. He has also created and written many major television series, including Collision, New Blood and the BAFTA-winning Foyle’s War. He lives in London with his wife, two sons and his dog, Boss.
You can find out more about Anthony and his work at:
www.alexrider.com
@AnthonyHorowitz
Other titles by Anthony Horowitz
The Alex Rider series
Stormbreaker
Point Blanc
Skeleton Key
Eagle Strike
Scorpia
Ark Angel
Snakehead
Crocodile Tears
Scorpia Rising
Russian Roulette Never Say Die
The Power of Five series
The Power of Five (Book One): Raven’s Gate
The Power of Five (Book Two): Evil Star
The Power of Five (Book Three): Nightrise
The Power of Five (Book Four): Necropolis
The Power of Five (Book Five): Oblivion
The Devil and His Boy
The Switch
Granny
Groosham Grange
Return to Groosham Grange
The Diamond Brothers books
The Falcon’s Malteser
Public Enemy Number Two
South by South East
The French Confection
I Know What You Did Last Wednesday
The Blurred Man
The Greek Who Stole Christmas
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. All statements, activities, stunts, descriptions, information and material of any other kind contained herein are included for entertainment purposes only and should not be relied on for accuracy or replicated as they may result in injury.
First published 2010 by Walker Books Ltd
87 Vauxhall Walk, London SE11 5HJ
This edition published 2018
Text © 2010, 2011, 2018 Stormbreaker Productions Ltd
Cover illustration © 2018 Tony Ross
The right of Anthony Horowitz to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, taping and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data:
a catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-1-4063-8688-2 (ePub)
www.walker.co.uk