“What would you like?” she asked us.
Danny stared at her, and then whispered, “Coca-Cola.”
“No gin-and-tonic?” I teased him.
He shook his head, without taking his eyes off Doris Kemble. He looked as if he had seen a ghost.
“There’s lots of crabs on the beach,” said Doris Kemble. “You could have a crab-race.”
Later, when Danny was playing on the rocks, Doris Kemble came and sat next to me. I sipped my lager contentedly, my hand lifted to shield my eyes from the mid-morning sun.
“He won’t remember any of it,” she said, after a while. “You will, but then it was your choice, to change things the way they are; and the whole responsibility for what happens now will be yours.”
“You’re still alive,” I asked her, “what about the Pickerings, and D-s Miller, and Harry Martin?”
“They’re still alive, too. None of them even know you.”
“Did any of it really happen?” I asked her.
She nodded. “Yes, it all happened. It’s all still happening, somewhere in time.”
“What about the Old Ones?”
“You could have destroyed their chances of returning for ever. But that wasn’t your choice. All you can do about the Old Ones is to pray… and do everything you can to forestall that day when the earth is so polluted that they can come back to life.”
“And young Mr Billings? And Mazurewicz?”
“Gone from here. Gone from now. But still there somewhere.”
“And Brown Jenkin?”
Doris Kemble laid her hand on top of mine. “Take my advice, David. Always keep an ear cocked for Brown Jenkin.”
*
We left Fortyfoot House the following day. I told the estate agents that I had just been forwarded a report from my GP in Brighton that I had a suspected heart murmur, and couldn’t attempt anything strenuous. I promised to pay them their money back, and I’m still doing it, at £5 a month.
Danny and I drove back to Brighton, and at the moment we’re living together in the back room of my old friend John Smart’s flat in Clifton Terrace. I like it up here. It’s sunny, and airy, and an easy walk down to the seafront (although it’s a bloody hard walk back up again.)
I kept only one souvenir of Fortyfoot House, and that’s the black-and-white photograph of young Mr Billings standing on the lawns, Fortyfoot House, 1888. I didn’t take it because I liked it. I took it because Kezia Mason worked her magic on it, and made it capable of movement. It’s like a barometer; like seaweed; like a weather-vane. If ever young Mr Billings goes looking for Brown Jenkin again, I shall be able to see it before it happens.
Every morning, while I’m making the coffee, I’ve made something of a ritual of taking a close look at that photograph. It’s up there, next to my Greenpeace poster.
This morning, October 15th, I thought I could make out a small dark triangular smudge behind the curve of the grassy lawn. I took the photograph to the window in order to scrutinize it in sunlight. Down in the yard below, among the overgrown elder-bushes, I could see Danny playing with his Dinky lorries, the sun shining on his hair. It looked as if he was building a municipal leisure center.
I studied the mark on the photograph intently. It’s possible that it was always there, and I just hadn’t noticed it before. A stain, a speck, anything.
But it could be a hat.
It could be the tip of an ear, or an upraised claw.
It could be that creature that still scurries through my nightmares every single night, long-clawed, yellow-eyed, yellow-fanged, scratching and tittering behind the wainscot of my sanity.
It could be something hunched-up and infinitely evil, running remorselessly towards us through the maze of time.
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GRAHAM MASTERTON was a bestselling horror writer for many years before he turned his talent to crime. He lived in Cork for five years, an experience that inspired the Katie Maguire series.
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About the Katie Maguire Series
Katie Maguire was one of seven sisters born to a police Inspector in Cork, but the only sister who decided to follow her father into An Garda Siochana.
With her bright green eyes and short redhair, she looks like an Irish pixie, but she is no soft touch. To the dismay of some of her male subordinates, she rose quickly through the ranks, gaining a reputation for catching Cork’s killers, often at great personal cost.
Katie spent seven years in a turbulent marriage in which she bore, and lost, a son – an event that continues to haunt her. Despite facing turmoil at home and prejudice at work, she is one of the most fearless detectives in Ireland.
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London, 1750
Beatrice Scarlet is the apothecary’s daughter. She can mix medicines and herbs to save the lives of her neighbours - but, try as she might, she can’t save the lives of her parents. An orphan at just sixteen, Beatrice marries a preacher and emigrates to America.
New Hampshire, 1756
In the farming community where Beatrice now lives, six pigs are found viciously slaughtered; slices of looking-glass embedded in their mouths. According to scripture, this is the work of Satan - but Beatrice Scarlet suspects the hands of men. As she closes in on the killer, she must act quickly to unmask him - or become the next victim herself…
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First published in the United Kingdom in 1992 by Mandarin
This eBook edition first published in the UK in 2017 by Head of Zeus Ltd
Copyright © Graham Masterton, 1992
The moral right of Graham Masterton to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN (E) 9781786695550
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