Eleanor retrieved the cigar from the carpet and disposed of it. She picked up the silver tray and placing upon it the decanter and glass from which Theodore had drunk, took them to the kitchen and washed them out thoroughly. She felt happier than she had been for a long time. She knew all along that Theodore had been a renegade insect. The massive walking cockroach had ceased to be, perhaps now ready to join the attic collection.
On the way to the study, she began to hum Badger’s odd tune and she gazed about her as she went, as if in awe of her surroundings. When in the study, she replaced the decanter into the cocktail cabinet.
She looked down to her mound and as though her clothing and flesh were made of glass she saw her baby, curled contentedly in her womb, cocooned and waving six legs. Then, distinctly and precisely, she believed that the being spoke to her. ‘Mummy,’ she heard as a soft whisper. She felt lightheaded and dreamy until a knife-edged pain seared through her abdomen and she nearly dropped the tray: labour pains, so soon despite Dr. Snippet telling them the birth would be at least another few weeks ahead.
Eleanor made her way to the hall – hunched over and with teeth clamped – but could go no further. She pushed a potted plant out of the way and lay the tray onto the hall stand to grasp her swollen belly. A burning and ripping within her womb spread to the tops of her thighs and to her chest. She stood panting for a while, riding the pain, then began to walk laboriously up the stairs, moaning softly, ‘Fire, fire.’
The strength to call out had gone. Her legs were as heavy as if weighed down with lead and yet her head seemed weightless and detached from her body. She even gave a chuckle when the idea of giving birth to her insect child on the staircase struck her as amusing but the blazing stabs returned, and winded her.
She reached the landing and was met by her husband and Mr. String. ‘My, they’re dropping like flies,’ laughed the barrister’s clerk.
‘So soon?’ Stubb cried out. Eleanor was overcome with the throbbing, shooting pain and she could not answer. ‘Don’t stand there like a bag of sawdust, go and fetch the doctor. Quick!’ yelled Stubb as all Mr. String could do was stare from one face to the other. Then his skinny legs flinched into motion and he bounded down the stairs at an admirable speed and ran across the hallway. He wrenched open the front door and ran out.
‘Come then, my love. Slowly does it,’ Stubb murmured, placing his arm around her shoulders and guiding her up the stairs.
Mr. String was back in the hall, calling. ‘I say, William old boy, doctor who?’
‘Dr. Snippet, you rotten bean pole. Now go.’
‘But I don’t know where he lives.’
Stubb growled. ‘Monstrous fool,’ he shouted. ‘Bacon Cottage, Pindle Lane. It’s only around the corner, over the other side of the green. Go.’
And Mr. String was gone.
CHAPTER 16
The Deal
‘I THINK, MR. STUBB, there is nothing more we can do,’ Dr. Snippet said, almost sadly.
‘But the labour pains.’
‘There is no more to worry about, I assure you. They will not start again until quite a few more hours. Then you will both have a gurgling child before you can say Jack Hodgson. About seven o’clock tomorrow morning, I would estimate. I had a feeling that the child would be early.’
‘When can I see her?’
‘I have given Mrs. Eleanor a mild herbal medication to make her relaxed. She needs rest. Now I must be going, though I will be at this address if you need me.’ He handed Stubb a rectangular card. ‘But I am sure there will be no need for that. Even so, the number of the telephone is there.’
‘A telephone machine? We don’t have such a thing.’
‘Not a worry; I would advise you, Mr. Stubb, to catch fifty winks and I will be back in four and a half hours’ time.’ He patted him on the back and departed.
Stubb felt exhausted but he knew that worse was to come. He went to the kitchen to make a cup of tea.
While sitting at the kitchen table and sipping the beverage slowly, he began to think. His immediate problem was the disposal of the body. He could hardly bury it in the garden. Could it be burned? He rejected the idea as he had no means to implement that.
As he thought, his mind ran into absurdities of which he could not rid himself, as one is prone to do with the onset of tiredness and when emotions have been agitated. He shuddered as a new voice promoted the theme that the disposal of Theodore would be easier if he was cut into small pieces. Stubb imagined throwing them, as though bits of bread, to the ducks on Laughing Pond, then pictured slices of flesh and whole limbs hanging in a butcher’s shop; a leg here, a lump there, with the severed head sitting on a marble slab, sightless and drained of blood. He groaned and rubbed his tired eyes to rid himself of the gruesome images.
Something had to be done quickly: if the body was kept for a week it would surely begin to decompose; for a month, to smell. It seemed a peculiar situation: there on the first floor (he looked to the ceiling as though he could see through it) lay a woman due to give birth and a dead man.
How would he explain a missing person to the authorities? No letters, notes, explanations, no spoken intentions of departure, no body, no funeral.
Funeral: the word unlocked a door within him and an image appeared of Mr. Nuckle, outside the sanatorium eight months before, loading a casket into the back of a hearse. The undertaker was well acquainted with the gardener, that much Stubb knew, and he surmised that any friend of Brood’s would not possess a total honesty. Besides, while working for Terps Joinery, he had heard rumours of Nuckle’s business procedures which implied a tarnished character. Could he be persuaded, with selected words and the right amount of promised money, to take the body without questions asked? There was a good chance. It was maybe his only chance.
He drank the remains of his tea and managed a wry smile. He would pay Mr. Nuckle well for disposing of his father. He would visit him tomorrow.
The silence of the kitchen was becoming more oppressive by the second. He stood and paced the stone floor, then made another tea. It remained in the cup with the milk forming a white skin on its surface. Still his mind would not rest. It was becoming as though his weary senses could hear cells within Theodore’s body emitting a sigh, one by one, as they gave up their life. See fluids draining down under the insistent force of gravity; smell the organic structures decomposing with the inevitable entropy – to wait until the next day was proving to be impossible. It would have to be that night.
He left the kitchen and got his thick overcoat for, though the rain had stopped, the sound of the wind wailing told him it was bitterly cold. He found Florence and informed her that he had to go out on urgent business. She was to listen for any sound from Eleanor. If there was any trouble she must fetch the doctor. He gave her the address. She was told not to disturb Theodore under any circumstances. ‘Why would I do that at this late hour, sir?’ she said.
Stubb walked across the short gravel drive to the already opened black iron gates, the hinges of both rusted solid long ago. The dark clouds which had marred the night sky had passed over and had been replaced by feathery formations. They would have more snow the next day. The slush on the pathways was beginning to freeze.
Brushing down his hair that was blown in all directions by the wind, he walked briskly past the snow-covered tree branches along Daisytrail Lane, on his way to Stutter Lane, with a feeling of joy in his heart. He had forgotten his trembling shock at the sight of his dead father and he thought only of the future. It would be good to be content again.
A row of modest houses slept along Grinding Road. Stubb checked the undertaker’s address in his notebook then studied each house in turn. The dwelling with the correct number stood with a bay window and purple door, and snow-laden bushes in the garden. Shrugging his shoulders and pulling the belt of his overcoat tighter about him he swung open the gate and marched along the path to the door. A sign was on the ground partly obscured by milk bottles. He read the sign and mutt
ered the words: ‘Chapel of Rest, Paradise Cottage, Grinding Road, Muchmarsh.’
He pulled the bell knob and a tinkling sound came from inside the house. He rubbed his hands briskly together to bring some heat back to them then snuffled impatiently. After counting ten taps of his big toe on the inside of his boot, he pulled the bell knob for a second time. There were shuffling noises from the interior. The door creaked open a fraction and a pair of bespectacled eyes peered cautiously from the gap.
‘What is it this time of night? Don’t you possess a watch? If you do possess one I strongly recommend that you look at it and when you realize it is later than you imagined, you will go away. Now, goodnight to you,’ said an irritated voice.
Stubb was embarrassed for he had had no thought for the time and he said, ‘I am sorry to disturb you at this late hour but I have urgent business. I’m sure you remember me.’
Mr. Nuckle opened the door wider and said, ‘What of it? What if I know or don’t know you? Coming here to my house, a total stranger at twelve o’clock at night. I’ve got a busy day tomorrow, I will have you know. A lot of arrangements to sort and I need my sleep like any hard working man and you stand on my doorstep talking and keep me up. Anyway, who are you?’
‘Mr. William Stubb, a previous employee of Terps. I was reminded of you by Brood,’ and he felt it best to add, ‘a fine fellow if I might say.’
Nuckle’s hand relaxed visibly at the gardener’s name; the joints of his fingers that curled around the door had been almost as white as his curly hair. He sighed a long, relieved sigh as though ridding himself of some mental burden. ‘Be quick about it,’ he snapped, with a hint of suspicion still. He opened the door wider and Stubb saw the small man possessing large, sorrowful eyes which were obscured for a moment when his spectacles reflected the moon. The similarity to Badger was remarkable; they must surely be twin brothers and yet he knew there was no family connection. Stubb almost expected Mr. Nuckle to begin singing or squawking, as Mr. Badger had done two hours before.
A dog barked in the distance at the silent alleys and lanes.
‘It concerns my father. It was a dreadful business but the honourable gentleman passed away quite suddenly two days ago – or was it yesterday? You see how grief has confused me so.’
‘Can’t you see?’ spluttered Nuckle angrily. He jabbed a finger at the sign by the milk bottles.
‘See what? I see your sign.’
‘Of course you do. It’s the sign I took down three days ago from the rest chapel. I’ve forgotten to take it in, that’s all.’ The time had come for him to do just that and he bent to retrieve it; and clutching the article in one hand, began to push the door closed.
‘Wait,’ Stubb said quickly, stopping the door with his foot. ‘Are you saying that you’re no longer an undertaker?’
Nuckle shook his head. ‘I have had my fill of that lark. Sold the plot, sold the stock, sold the horse and the cart. Sold the lot. So I’m getting out before it’s too late.’ Stubb decided not to remark although his mind bounced through possibilities of the man’s meaning. Maybe he had been correct in his estimation of his character. ‘I am going into the catering business,’ Nuckle announced proudly. ‘I have bought a place overlooking the green. Now, goodnight.’
‘But my father, he needs burial.’
‘Well, you’ll have to find someone else then, won’t you? Goodnight to you, Mr. Pub.’
Stubb ignored the mistake and stood his ground. ‘Look here, Mr. Nuckle. I will pay you double your normal charge. Triple even. Please, one more transaction before you give up your fine profession.’
Nuckle looked pensive but then rubbing his unshaven, bristly chin, a tentative interest lit in his eyes. He finally opened the plain door to his terraced house. A musty but aromatic scent clung to Stubb’s nostrils. There, on the unvarnished floorboards of the small hallway, were sprays of dried carnations and sheaves of lilies, green wreaths with dessicated roses and pansies about them, bouquets, posies and baskets, flower cushions and pillows, heart-shaped floral arrangements and pots and glass vases filled with cream and white petaled dehydrated flowers, orange, purple and red. All of a sumptuous garden’s bounty seemed to be there, along with larger presentations that Stubb could see through a gap in the doorway leading to the front room. And even while he stood outside, the powerful odour of the blooms, all in different states of decay, some already dried and fallen to pieces of potpourrie, made him feel unusually light-headed. A pile of sympathy cards, almost as tall as the funeral parlour director, stood in one corner, the striated paper column made up of deckle-edged and black sided card.
Come in quick; quickly come in,’ Mr. Nuckle said, his voice hushed and urgent. ‘But only if the price is right,’ he added.
CHAPTER 17
Spectre
ELEANOR FELT AS light as a gas. The herbal infusion that Dr. Snippet had prescribed was making her weary and with feelings of intoxication yet sleep eluded her. She had become hot and restless and confused. She weakly thumped her pillow into shape and sat herself up with the certainty that Alastair would be released from her soon, along with the small fire in her womb becoming extinguished.
Brood curled his lip in contempt. He remained motionless with fingers splayed and arms outstretched as though imitating a tree. His breathing was slow. He stared without expression at the rat which twitched its whiskers and seemingly glanced innocently up to him whereupon the animal resumed eating the cake which had been left on the shed floor as bait.
It was another cold night and the gardener had found that he had been unable to sleep. He hated cold more than anything; he resented coldness even more than William Stubb and the rats. After finding more sacking to cover himself he had slept fitfully but only to have been awakened by scratching and scurrying vermin, so keen were his ears to the night sounds.
The gardener moved a fraction of an inch at a time until his hand rested on the end of the spade, leaning in the corner of his shed. He held his breath and waited with patience for the moment when he would squash the life out of the furriness which dared to sit on his floor and eat his cake.
He raised the spade, level with his head, in preparation to strike. But before he moved further, the rat emitted a squeak, its skinny body shaking violently, its red pinpoint eyes flaring until it fell onto its side. It opened its mouth to show rows of fine, pointed teeth until they were covered by blood that sprang from inside the starched body. It had happened in a moment.
Brood stared, baffled and annoyed. Baffled because he could not remember lacing the food – indeed, why he would have spoilt one of his much-loved cakes with poison – and annoyed because he had been deprived of the pleasure of destroying another of the loathsome creatures which inhabited his territory. He cursed and flushed, and kicked a workbench when he was reminded that Eleanor – or whoever else had taken it – had returned the rat poison. Then on the impulse of the moment, he pulled on a shirt and overalls and put on his boots and gloves as well as two coats and went out into the night. Another rat appeared from behind the mechanical lawnmower.
When the sun sleeps and it has taken with it the colours of day, it makes way for darkness to creep over the landscape, painting the legacy of the sun in sombre, darker colours – smoke-black, umber and ebony. Evils, real and imagined, thrive. It is the time when children are pushed shaking and crying from their nightmares into the worse nightmare of the darkness where the fear of the unknown is born. Fear lives in the cobwebs, steely grey, and in shadows that hang like waiting bats in holes and corners and caves.
The drapes had not been drawn and the moon shone an eerie glow into Eleanor’s charcoal-shadowed room. It painted objects with a silver tinge enabling them to be picked out in detail while others were smothered in blackness.
Eleanor felt lonely. She was about to call her husband but changed her mind when she felt it to be childish. Her loneliness had become companion to nervousness then, for her familiar companion, darkness, was playing tricks on her. Was that a balloo
n of light, a globe of brightness which contracted and expanded and was floating to the ceiling? The more she strained her head forward to pierce the night in the room, the more the hazy shape lost definition. She felt tearful and suspiciously kept her fatigued eyes to it. It was then she realised it was nothing more than a lampshade stored on top of the wardrobe. She could even see some pattern upon it.
Her eyelids became weighty; a lethargy swamped her and she had no choice but to close her eyelids. Wriggling further under the covers, she tried to find sleep.
A noise then, she was convinced. With an effort, she scanned the dark bedroom for its source. She whimpered. Upon hearing her own voice she felt foolish. It was the worst thing she could do, she told herself, to let panic take hold on the important occasion of a queen giving birth to her child. A high royal privilege, to have been chosen as a channel for the reincarnation of her darling Alastair. Her work of lighting the way in the church had not been in vain.
The dark shapes still floated and swam, swirling and congealing, dissolving into granular and fluid whorls. She was well acquainted with interiors as black ink, night during a day, sacred dust and insect envoys busy with their assignment, the frozen tombs and crypt corridors hidden from the sun. Despite this, Eleanor still let out a short cry; it seemed evident that a human form was there, standing in the corner of the room beside the door. Perhaps one of the stone figures forever asleep on one of the crypt caskets in the church had become alive, animated and in a visiting mood. She could make out a fraction of a shoulder though the rest was lost to the heavy blanket of the night.
In a weak and tremulous voice she cried out, ‘Sir Bertrand? William?’ The figure seemed to sway. ‘Who’s there? Who is it? I command you tell Queen Eleanor.’ Her voice sounded listless. There was no answer except for the ticking from the clockwork beside the bed. This is becoming ridiculous, she thought to herself. Perhaps it was knowing that her father-in-law – the massive cockroach with hidden antennae, mandibles and cold, compound eyes – lay dead only a few rooms away that was stimulating her imagination to frightening images.
The Unusual Possession of Alastair Stubb Page 9