by Mark Morris
Then, as though someone had whispered the solution in my ear, I stepped on to the grassy verge and crossed to the stone wall that bounded the field containing the scarecrow. I leaned forward and, using both hands, lifted up a capping stone. It was thick and heavy as a stack of dinner plates. I was desperate to stop the animal’s pain, but I forced myself to move slowly and carefully so as not to stumble and drop the stone on my toes. I moved back across the grass verge and on to the road where the hare still kicked and screamed. I positioned the rock directly above its head, then shuffled my feet back so that my shoes wouldn’t get spattered when the stone crushed its skull. I told myself to do it now, to let go of the stone, but my arms seemed locked, I couldn’t bring myself to let go. And the longer I held on, the louder became the doubts in my mind. What if the stone wasn’t enough to kill it? What if it simply fractured the animal’s skull, adding to its agony?
I don’t know how long I stood there dithering. And I don’t know how long I might have stood if the hare had not given a final convulsive shudder, belched out a gush of blood which fanned out around its head, and died.
My strength seemed to ebb with the creature’s life. The stone in my hands was all at once unbearably heavy. I could hardly turn away before letting it go. It hit the tarmac with a crack and split open, revealing a crumbly core, the colour of golden sand. My hands felt scoured by the stone’s surface. I felt scoured inside too, scraped out, nausea harsh in my belly.
I turned away from the eviscerated animal, and the brilliant green of the field ambushed me, made my eyes sting. It was the sun, hanging high above the field, which made the grass burn like green fire. I squinted, my head aching. At first I thought the grey blot I could see in the green was some fleck of dark matter in my eye. Then my vision shifted, refocused, and I realized it was the scarecrow I’d briefly noticed earlier.
Only it couldn’t have been a scarecrow, because its arms, outstretched before, were now sinking to its sides. I blinked again, shielded my eyes with my right hand, but the figure was difficult to focus upon. If it was a man standing out there in the middle of the field he looked unnaturally grey – his clothes, his skin, even his hair seemed to be the colour of clay. I shook my head as if it would help clear my vision, and saw the figure half-raise its hand as though greeting or marking me, then begin to walk in my direction.
All at once I was terrified and I didn’t really know why. There was simply something indefinably horrible about the way the figure was striding towards me. Sick with panic, I turned and ran for my car, my breath so ragged it felt as if it were tearing my throat. I seemed to be moving in slow motion, my body heavy and lethargic. Pulling open the car door, getting into my seat, turning on the ignition – each of these things seemed to take an age. Scared of looking in my mirror for fear of what I might see behind me, I tore away with a screech of tyres, and didn’t slow down until, three miles later, I reached Greenwell.
three
My first impression of the town was that it discouraged visitors. Greenwell’s centre, such as it was, could only be reached via a circuitous, badly signposted route of narrow, potholed streets. The buildings that lined these streets hardly made it seem worth discovering the hub. For the most part they were stolid and unattractive, made of grime-blackened stone that even in the sunshine gave them an air of gloom and neglect. There was no greenery in evidence; in fact, wherever I looked I saw merely dark colours – or rather, a negation of colour. Greenwell seemed as though it was generating its own murk, its own hazy canopy, beneath which it dozed, unseen and forgotten.
I couldn’t understand why Alex had wanted to leave London to come here. The town seemed not merely dead, but stagnant, rotting. Perhaps it had hidden charms, though the few people I could see walking about looked as depressed as the place made me feel. Hunched over and colourless, they reminded me of woodlice, perambulating mindlessly. ‘The Greenwell shuffle,’ I said to myself, just as a sign reading WEDGE SQUARE appeared in front of me, pointing to the left.
Wedge Square. That’s what Alex had told me to look out for if I ever popped down for a visit. I’d insisted on directions as soon as he moved in. ‘It’s a bit complicated,’ he had said on the phone. ‘If you can get to the Square I can give you directions from there.’
Wedge Square. An ugly name in an ugly place. I turned left and moments later found myself at the barely beating heart of the community.
The Square was remarkable only in that nothing had been made of it. There was no statue, no war memorial, no ornamental fountain, no grass, no flowers, no trees. There was simply, as the sign stated, a square, whose cracked, uneven flagstones had created hollows where muddy pools of yesterday’s rain water had collected. Perhaps in days gone by the area had been a centre of commerce, a marketplace, but now that mantle had been taken up by the sorry, rundown collection of buildings that bordered it.
There was a pub, a post office, a butcher’s, a baker’s, a greengrocer’s, a bank, a chemist’s and a hardware store. The pub was called the Solomon Wedge, and boasted a painting of its namesake on a hanging wooden sign above the door. If the likeness was accurate, then the original Solomon Wedge had been a fat, bewhiskered, fierce-looking Victorian. I wondered who he was. The town’s founder? No, the place must date further back than the last century.
As I got closer to the pub, I noticed a square of white paper sellotaped to the inside of one of its dark windows. Written on the paper in thick black marker pen were the words ACCOMMODATION AVAILABLE. I can stay there, I thought, if … if what? If I don’t find Alex? But then, why shouldn’t I? My even entertaining the thought that there might be something sinister about Alex’s not getting in touch made me angry with myself.
I stopped the car on the kerb in front of the pub, opened the glove compartment, and snatched out the folded sheet of notepaper resting on top of the car manual and the fat envelope of AA documents. I spent the next two minutes reading the directions to Alex’s flat; my brother had been right when he’d said it was complicated. For a small town Greenwell was crammed with streets. Parks, gardens and playgrounds had seemingly been sacrificed to accommodate more buildings. Why, I couldn’t begin to guess. It wasn’t as though the place had a thriving local industry, nor was there any evidence that it ever had. It didn’t even have the feel of a commuter town; it was too ugly and gloomy, the houses too small and neglected for moneyed townies seeking a bucolic retreat. In fact, from my admittedly brief experience of it, Greenwell didn’t give the impression of being anything. It seemed like a town without purpose, stuck out in the middle of nowhere, with nothing much going for it. A place to live and a place to die, and that was all.
From the Square, streets radiated outwards like the spokes from the hub of a wheel. If Alex’s instructions were correct, then the fourth turn after the pub should be Coldpike Lane. I started the car and moved back out on to the road. Though mine was the only moving vehicle in the vicinity, none of the half dozen or so people I could see wandering around paid me the slightest attention. I counted the roads as I passed them, murmuring the numbers under my breath as if afraid I’d be somehow deceived if I stayed silent. Sure enough, when I came upon the entrance to Coldpike Lane I felt a fierce surge of joy, as though just seeing the words written on the metal street sign meant I was already closer to Alex.
Alex’s directions were spot on, and five minutes later I was pulling up in front of the building where he lived. It was a tall, narrow house, one of a terrace of dark Victorian properties that had been converted into flats. In common with the rest of the town, there was no front garden, though there was a tiny yard with a low brick wall in front of it, which at least meant that the front door did not open directly on to the pavement. I got out of the car and walked into the house’s cold shadow. Beside the front door were six buttons, each labelled with a small white rectangle of waterlogged card. No names, just flat numbers.
I pressed the top left-hand button, the button for flat six, and waited. I wasn’t surprised at the
lack of response. It was Monday morning; if Alex wasn’t ill in his flat, then he’d be at the school now. I tried the other buttons in descending order. When I got to three, a voice so crackly with static that it was impossible to tell whether it was male or female said, ‘Who is it?’
‘Oh, hi,’ I said, trying to sound bright and friendly. ‘I’m trying to get in touch with Alex Gemmill. He lives in flat six. I’m his sister, Ruth.’
There was no reply, and I wondered if whoever I’d been talking to had stopped listening when they realized I wasn’t here to see them. ‘Er … are you still there?’ I asked.
‘This is flat three,’ said the voice bluntly, its sex still indeterminate.
‘Yes, I realize that,’ I said. ‘I’ve tried my brother’s flat, but he’s not in. I was wondering if you could buzz me in so I can leave him a note.’
Again I thought the person in flat three had gone without bothering to reply, but then there was a sound like an angry wasp and I pushed at the door, which opened with a click. I went inside and shut the door behind me.
The hallway I walked into was clean but featureless. It had cream walls and a thin but hard-wearing light brown carpet which must have been laid fairly recently because it still had that fresh, new carpety smell. I was quite surprised, actually. I’d expected to walk into somewhere dingy and musty, with scuffed, dirty walls and a manky old carpet. There was nothing in the hallway except a low MFI-style table with a few envelopes on it. I sifted through them. Bills and circulars mostly. Nothing for Alex.
Ahead of me, taking up two-thirds of the width of the hallway, was the staircase. Tucked into the corridor to the left of that was an unmarked door which I vaguely recalled Alex telling me was a laundry room. I went upstairs, the old steps creaking. There was no other sound in the house, not even from flat three. I had a mental image of the occupant of that flat standing motionless, ear to the door, listening as I ascended. It gave me the creeps, particularly as I couldn’t imagine what sex they might be. I thought again of the grey figure in the field and of my absolute terror as it had come striding towards me. I found it hard now to recapture the intensity of that emotion. It had happened less than half an hour ago, but already I was beginning to wonder if it had really been as I remembered it.
At the top of the first flight of stairs was a square landing with a door on either side. The door to my right had a black plastic number one screwed to it, the one on my left a number two. The back wall was dominated by a huge window with an old-fashioned catch which looked down on to a small yard bordered by a crumbling brick wall. Beyond the wall the ground sloped away steeply, which made the descending rows of smaller terraced houses which had been built on it look precariously perched. I wouldn’t have fancied living at the top of one of those streets, though if you were a kid getting to the bottom would have been fun on a bike. Beyond the rows of terraces, which looked like dominoes waiting to be knocked over, were undulating fields and thick green clumps of woodland.
From here, with the sun shining on it, the place looked peaceful, idyllic even. Despite living in London, Alex had always been in his element in the countryside. Food for the soul, he called it, whenever we managed to get out of the city and surround ourselves with trees and flowers and meadows. Alex was great to be with in the country. When it came to flora and fauna he was a mine of information. He could recognize birds both by their song and their plumage, knew which trees and plants were which, and was always pointing out dens and nests and small animals, once even a snake curled up in the grass – stuff that the majority of us clodhopping townies tend to miss.
I went up another flight, which took me on to the landing containing the doors to flats three and four. I stared at the door numbered three, again wondering whether I was being listened to or even observed. I glanced down at the keyhole, but saw only blackness. Then, not wishing to appear intimidated, I turned my back and went up the next flight of stairs, making a conscious effort not to tiptoe.
This was the top of the house, but it was the same layout – square landing, a door on either side, a window on the back wall. I went up to Alex’s door, number six, and did all the usual things. I knocked, I called his name, I had a peek through the keyhole. I hadn’t expected him to be in, but I felt disappointed all the same. I supposed I’d hoped to see some evidence of him – some funny little sign he’d put on the door to make it less austere than all the others. Or a pair of his muddy walking boots sitting on newspaper on the landing outside. Or … oh, I don’t know. Just something different, something to mark him out, to let me know he’d been here. Silly, I know, but I missed my brother. I’d come all this way, I was standing right outside his flat, but I still didn’t feel as if I was close to him.
I might have come here on impulse, but at least I’d had the foresight to realize that I might have to write him a note. I took a notepad and biro from my shoulder bag and, after a moment’s thought, wrote:
Hi, Alex!
Surprise! I’ve come all the way up from London to see you, but you’re not here. I thought I’d stay for a few days if that’s OK. I’ll book myself into the Solomon Wedge pub, so give me a ring when you get home from work. Hope you’re free tonight. I’ll look forward to seeing you later.
Love you,
Ruth
I shoved the note under his door and started back downstairs. Despite not having found Alex, I still felt positive, purposeful. I’d head back into town, book myself into the Solomon Wedge and see if I could find out which school Alex might be teaching at. Not that I’d disturb him at work, not today at least, but it would be useful to have the information.
I had descended the first flight of stairs, and had turned the corner on to the second, when I saw the spider. It was halfway down the stairs, motionless, as if it had been waiting for me. It was about eight millimetres long, with long, slender legs, and was light fawn in colour – almost the colour of the carpet it was standing on, in fact, so it looked fairly innocuous. Maybe my eye was drawn to it because it was the only thing in front of me that wasn’t all flat planes and sharp angles. I’m not keen on spiders – I mean I wouldn’t pick one up – but they don’t bother me too much. Ordinarily, I wouldn’t have paid the thing much attention. I’d have probably just stepped over it with a little shudder. This was different, though. On this occasion I halted with a gasp and felt a prickling sensation run up my legs and through my body. Thanks to Alex, I knew without a shadow of a doubt that the spider on the stairs in front of me was a fiddleback.
The reason it shocked me so much is because you don’t get fiddlebacks in Britain. You get them in Australia, North America, hotter parts of Europe. They’re not that impressive-looking, and they’re actually quite shy, reclusive creatures. They can give you a nasty bite, though. Their venom doesn’t usually kill – though it has been known to – but it can cause illness and horrible, pustulating skin ulcers that sometimes take months to heal.
I stared at the fiddleback, and for a couple of seconds I felt as though it was staring at me, marking me. Then it became a blur of brown, and was gone.
I’m not saying it disappeared into thin air. I’m not saying it was a phantom spider or a hallucination or anything like that. All I know is, one moment I was looking at it, the next it had eluded me. And that – suddenly not knowing where it was – was worse than seeing the thing in the first place.
Suddenly a horrible thought struck me. Had Alex not been getting in touch because one of his insects had bitten him? Maybe he was sick, or even paralysed, and couldn’t get to the phone or the door. I started to feel panic rising in me for a moment, and then I fought it down. No, be sensible. Alex knew how to handle his creatures. He was always ultra-careful. Besides, he had antidotes for every type of insect venom. He always kept a phial and a needle right beside him when there was any chance whatsoever that he might get bitten or stung.
Then again, he was careful – no, more than careful, obsessive – about making sure his creatures couldn’t escape from their g
lass tanks. And yet the fiddleback had escaped, hadn’t it? So something, somewhere, had gone wrong.
I ran back upstairs and pounded on Alex’s door. ‘Alex,’ I shouted. ‘Alex, it’s me, Ruth! If you’re in there, please find some way to answer.’
Again, there was no response, so I ran back downstairs, keeping a wary eye out for the fiddleback, and knocked on the door of flat three.
I waited for thirty seconds, but the door remained closed, so I banged again, harder. I think I’ve already said I don’t like conflict – I’d had a bellyful of it from my dad, and my relationship with Matt had hammered whatever excess stuffing I might have had out of me – but at that moment I felt ready to take on anyone. If whoever I’d spoken to on the buzzer had continued to refuse to answer, I would probably have shouted something along the lines of, ‘I know you’re in there and I won’t go away until you open this door.’ But then the door did open – albeit only a crack – and a face peered out.
It was a small face, pale and gaunt, with pinched, narrow features and sunken, red-rimmed eyes that made me think of chronic insomnia. A few minutes earlier I hadn’t been able to tell this person’s sex from their voice, and now that I was confronting them face to face I still couldn’t. The gap he or she was peering through was so narrow that all I could see of their hair was a few lank and greasy strands of fringe. I felt my annoyance seeping away, to be replaced by a sense of shame at my own robustness, a feeling that I’d used it to bully my way into this person’s life.
‘I’m sorry to disturb you,’ I said with what I hoped was an ingratiating smile, ‘but I need your help.’