Mirror Image

by Michael Scott

  And still with no sound.

  Beaumont was aware of his own harsh, ragged breathing, his rapid gasps as his own orgasm approached, but there was no other sound … no other sound. His concentration faltered … and the image flickered. For one brief moment the woman behind his back was not Manny Frazer, but another, older woman, full-bodied, long-haired … long-haired … long … hair …

  His hand slowed its pumping as the realization struck home. It wasn’t Manny Frazer standing behind him. He was almost afraid now to turn around while behind him the woman continued to arouse herself with complete abandon. He leaned forward, resting his forehead head against the cool glass, supporting himself with his left hand …

  And screamed!

  Agony tore through his body, lancing across his face and up through his hand. There was fire before his eyes … inches before his eyes.

  Fire in the glass.

  Fire on the glass.

  The glass was burning.

  His flesh bubbled, blistered, scorched, and then cracked. It fell in blackened strips from his hand, flesh and fat bubbling in the intense heat. His hair crisped, then ignited, the styling gel running in boiling liquid strips down his back. The silk suit melted onto his body as the flesh burnt off his face and neck, his eyes sizzling, boiling in their sockets, tongue shriveling in his mouth. He sucked in breath to scream—and swallowed flame—and his shout was accompanied by a vomited ball of fire.

  And his last conscious thought before the agony totally consumed him was the sudden jerking throb of ecstasy as his orgasm took him.

  28

  THE HOWL of triumph ripped through the Otherworld.

  Raw power, naked energy, bright coruscating colors rippled across the gray landscape, the vibrations taking a long time to die away.

  Another soul, trembling, afraid, and in agony had been dragged into its trap.

  It savored the pain. It fed off the agony. It drew strength from the terror.

  It had taken the creature’s death, accepted it as its due.

  It was close now, so very close.

  It needed a little more sustenance.

  It craved blood. For blood was the life.

  Just a little more.

  29

  THE SMELL brought Manny running. The sickening, cloying, foul smell of burnt meat and leaves, of dried wood and leather. Oily black smoke was curling from the guesthouse, twisting in the still afternoon air.

  She couldn’t imagine what Robert had done, probably dropped a cigarette onto an expensive upholstered chair. But he hadn’t smoked when she’d known him, well not the ordinary kind.

  She slowed down when she reached the guesthouse, the nauseous smell troubling her already delicate stomach. She felt her gorge rise. The greasy smoke coiled around her, making her eyes water, clinging to her T-shirt, adhering to her skin, coating her lips, her mouth.

  “Robert? Robert? Are you there, Robert?”

  Where the fuck was he?

  “ROBERT!”

  Ducking beneath the billowing smoke, she ran to the nearest window and, pressing her face close to the glass and cupping her hands over her eyes, she peered inside. The thick white smoke blanketed everything, but she could see no flames. Nor was there any sign of Robert. Maybe he’d been overcome by the smoke …

  Manny ran back to the house, heart pounding as she picked up the phone, fingers trembling as she punched in the numbers.

  “Nine-one-one, what is your emergency?”

  Manny looked out the back door of the kitchen as the smoke thickened and intensified. Her words, breathless, “Smoke, fire, there’s a fire.”

  “Ma’am, I need you to calm down, what is your location?”

  Manny ran back towards the guesthouse, the phone clenched in her right hand.

  “Ma’am, are you still there?”

  Manny reached the door of the guesthouse, breathless, and cracked it open, the air sucked out billowing smoke, engulfing her face, making her cough and splutter.

  “Ma’am…”

  “Robert, where the fuck are you, ROBERT!” She held the phone back to her ear and blurted out the words before dropping the phone. “You need to hurry.”

  She ran back to the outdoor cold-water tap hidden in amongst the bushes at the edge of the path. There was the curl of a green hose half hidden in the bushes. Turning on the tap, she attempted to drag the hose towards the guesthouse, but the hose was kinked and a dribble of water leaked from the head. She tried to rip a strip off her T-shirt, but the material refused to tear and she ended up soaking the hem of the shirt with water, then bringing it up across her mouth and nose. Then, squeezing her eyes almost shut against the smoke, she ducked inside the guesthouse.

  The smoke was everywhere, thick and white at eye-level, dark and slick closer to the floor. It twisted and curled like fog, but she found if she stood to one side of the door, it was possible to make out a little detail.

  “ROBERT!” Her voice, muffled by the wet T-shirt, was lost in the swirling smoke. Rubbing her streaming eyes, blinking away the tears that clung to her long eyelashes, outlining everything in glistening rainbows, she pressed forward, looking for the source of the fire. Goddammit: where were the fire extinguishers? As far as she could recall, they were somewhere close to the workbench which ran along the wall. Her father had refused to install a sprinkler system, saying that if there ever was a fire—which was extremely unlikely—the water would probably do more damage than the flames.

  She scraped her bare shins on the side of a chair and hopped back, swearing, tears of pain springing to her eyes. Where the fuck was Beaumont?

  She caught movement out of the corner of her eye and turned quickly, moving forward. The smoke twisted up, thicker now. “Robert?” she mumbled, moving closer.

  The fire was around here somewhere. The smoke was thick and cloying, the stench appalling. She swallowed hard, bitterly regretting the amount she’d drunk and smoked the previous night.

  Again the movement … a flicker … a face?

  “Robert?”

  The smoke cleared and Manny screamed! She staggered back, heart pounding, legs beginning to tremble with reaction. Then, realizing what she’d seen, she attempted to laugh, but the sound caught at the back of her throat: she had been looking at herself in the mirror. She hadn’t recognized herself in that sudden, brief glimpse of a pale-faced, wide-eyed, semi-naked woman.

  The smoke seemed to be coming from directly in front of the mirror. She stepped forward, frowning. There was a pile of smoldering rags on the floor.

  Manny stooped to look closer at them.

  On some deep subconscious level, she had already recognized the incinerated man-like shape on the floor, but refused to accept what she was seeing. She poked at the seared cloth with her forefinger, cinders spiraling upwards to dance briefly in the air. Metal glinted, gold against the blackened mess and she touched it, hooking it out of the ash.

  It was a watch, a fake gold Rolex watch. The face was cracked, the casing melted to sludge in the intense heat, the enameled face bubbled and warped. Engraved on the back, barely visible beneath the patina of soot was the line, “Robert Maurice Beaumont.”

  And she suddenly recognized, she suddenly accepted what she was seeing.

  The watch dropped from her nerveless fingers, falling onto the burnt meat, sinking into the chest cavity, a tiny blue flame dancing about the hole.

  She scrabbled away, wrapping her arms around her knees, hugging them close to her body, swallowing again and again, bile flooding her throat and mouth. She closed her eyes, squeezing them shut, but the images—vivid, bloody images, of whitened bone and blackened flesh, a charred skull, strips of crisped hair clinging to it, of an arm that ended in a knotted stump—all the images remained.

  And the smoke.

  The smoke coiling sinuously from the body, flowing upwards, crawling across the surface of the mirror, clinging to it, wreathing across the surface, forming shapes, forming pictures, forming faces.

 
Tony Farren …

  Diane Williams …

  Robert Beaumont.

  Face upon face, image upon image. Eyes wide, mouths open in soundless agony.

  Calling to her …

  Pleading with her …

  Enticing her …

  Emmanuelle Frazer opened her mouth and screamed until her throat bled.

  30

  “THIS IS ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous. Your insinuations are absurd.”

  “Maybe you might want to wait until your lawyer arrives, Mr. Frazer…” Margaret Haaren suggested quietly.

  “I don’t see why. Your allegations are unfounded. I am innocent of these ridiculous charges,” Frazer continued, almost trembling with rage.

  “There have been no charges, Mr. Frazer. You are merely helping us with our investigations.” She looked up as José Pérez came into the small office, his broad face completely impassive, a manila folder in his hand. Without a word he came around the desk and placed the folder before her, and then took up a position at the door, arms folded, eyes fixed on her face. Even before she opened the folder, she knew it was bad news.

  “You must appreciate our position, Mr. Frazer,” she continued, speaking to him while her eyes ran down the single typed sheet. “You told us you bought a mirror in London, the same mirror which inadvertently caused the death of one of your employees, the same mirror which a mysterious scarred man offered to buy, the same mirror another employee died guarding. And yet the auction house in South London has never heard of you, they have no record of ever having dealt with you before, and there was no mirror of the size you describe sold at the auction that day. We contacted the shipping company; the people whom you said delivered the mirror have no record of ever having dealt with you. We are left with one conclusion,” she finished softly, having absorbed the impact of what she had just read, “that you have lied to us, Mr. Frazer.”

  “But why,” he began, almost desperately, “what possible reason would I have to lie to you?”

  The phone on Margaret Haaren’s desk rang, interrupting the already tense atmosphere; she picked it up and listened intently to the voice on the other end, her eyes never moving from Frazer’s face. “That’s all you have at the moment? I see … thank you.”

  Margaret Haaren stood up and reached for the jacket draped across the back of the chair. “I think you had better come with us, Mr. Frazer.”

  “Why? Where are we going?” he demanded, not moving.

  “We’re taking you home. There has been … an accident.”

  Jonathan leapt to his feet. “An accident! What sort of accident?”

  “We’re not sure. A fire in your guesthouse. Your daughter seems to have been injured.”

  Frazer looked at her in horror, the color draining from his face.

  “I’ve no further details, I’m afraid,” she lied, not telling him about the grisly carcass that had been discovered in the guesthouse.

  * * *

  SIRENS HOWLING, THEY drove across Los Angeles in the unmarked police car. José drove, while Margaret sat in the passenger seat, half turned to look at Frazer, sitting wide-eyed, white-faced and trembling in the back seat. She could smell the rancid odor of his fear leaking from his pores, and this, more than anything else, convinced her that Frazer was not their culprit.

  It took fifteen minutes to reach the house. A paramedic unit screamed out of the driveway as they turned in, while two fire trucks, their red flashing lights reflecting off the exterior of main house, were parked directly behind one another in the driveway. Lines of deflated yellow fire hoses led around the side of the house down to the guesthouse.

  The detectives parked their car alongside a coroner’s vehicle just as a black body bag was being loaded into the back. Frazer gave a scream of anguish and leapt from the still moving car, screaming as he ran across the drive towards the startled coroner’s aides. Still shouting, he managed to pull the zip of the body bag down and revealed a burnt and tattered eyeless face before Detective Pérez grabbed his arms and physically hauled him away. “That’s not your daughter. She’s alive. She’s alive, she’s OK.”

  Frazer collapsed onto the ground, his head buried in his hands, sobs racking through him. José Pérez sat down beside him and put his arm around Frazer’s shoulder. “It’s OK, it’s OK, it’s not Manny. She’s fine, she saw the body and fainted, we think. The paramedics say she wasn’t injured; maybe a mild concussion, some smoke inhalation, nothing more.”

  “I thought … I thought … I thought…” Frazer hiccupped.

  “I know what you thought. I’ve a girl about Manny’s age myself. I know what you were thinking.”

  Frazer rubbed his hand across his eyes and attempted to stand, but his legs felt like water and the detective helped him to his feet. As the coroner pulled away, he looked at Pérez. “Well if that wasn’t Manny, who was it?”

  “We don’t know yet. The body was found in your guesthouse, burnt beyond recognition, all identity burnt with it. All we have left is some rags and the remains of a gold watch.”

  “A watch? Whose?”

  “We don’t know yet, forensics will take care of that.”

  “But if the fire was that intense, what about the guesthouse…” Frazer gasped.

  “Untouched.”

  Frazer looked at him uncomprehendingly. “How?”

  “I’ve seen it once before, many years ago when I was a patrol officer. I was called in to investigate an old man who hadn’t been seen for days. We found him in his apartment sitting in his chair. But although he was burnt to a crisp, the chair he’d been sitting on had only been scorched. The pathologist told me it was called spontaneous combustion. Happens to maybe twenty people a year; they just burst into flames, from the inside out as it were.” He shrugged. “No one knows why or how it happens; just one of life’s little mysteries, I guess.”

  “I’d like to see the guesthouse please.”

  “I’m not sure.…” José Pérez caught Margaret Haaren’s nod, and then smiled. “Sure. Why not? Let’s go.”

  The two men walked around the side of the house. Haaren trailed along discreetly. As they neared the guesthouse they could see police officers and the fire fighters milling about, while from inside, light flashed at regular intervals as the scene of the death was recorded. Frazer moved through the crowd, shouldering his way into the darkened interior, blinking quickly to restore his sight. He walked right up to the mirror, looking closely at it before realizing he was standing on the remains of some damp ashes.

  Haaren looked at Pérez. Neither of them had told Frazer where the body had been discovered. And the guesthouse was large, the body could have been anywhere.

  Frazer abruptly turned away, his face set and expressionless. When he stepped out into the sunlight, he was breathing quickly and his face had an unhealthy cast to it.

  “What was that all about? A touch of guilt?” Pérez whispered to Haaren.

  The woman shook her head. “Not sure, but it’s significant.” The detective strode forward and caught up beside him, touching his arm. “Slow down Mr. Frazer…”

  “There!” he hissed. “There.” His voice rose to a shout. “THERE!”

  She followed the direction of his stiffly pointing arm. There was a tall, broad man standing at the end of the driveway among a small crowd of curious neighbors, his face in shadow, only his shock of white hair visible.

  Frazer’s fingers closed painfully on her arm, his eyes wild with excitement. “That’s him! That’s the scarred man.”

  “I’ll get him,” José Pérez murmured, hurrying past them, drawing his gun, crunching stones beneath his shoes. The stranger turned away and faded back into the crowd. “Shit,” Pérez murmured, putting on a spurt of speed. He was too old for this. “STOP!” he shouted.

  Haaren turned, pointing to the two officers who had come to investigate the shouting. “Go with him. Quickly.”

  José Pérez pounded down the driveway. The crowd of onlookers scattered quickly. He
raced around the corner and had time to register a looming shape before he was grabbed by the arms and hauled off his feet. He was slammed against the ornate wrought iron fence, the back of his head snapping off the metal, dazing him.

  “What happened back there?” The voice was hard. The huge man began shaking him, holding him inches off the ground, rattling him from side to side. “Answer me,” he grated.

  “F-f-f-fuck you…”

  “Hey you!” The two officers rounded the corner and were almost on top of the white haired man before he—or they—realized it. The younger of the two men fumbled for his gun and shouted aloud before the big man—still holding Pérez pinned to the fencing—kicked the officer high in the chest with the flat of his foot. The force of the tremendous blow snapped ribs, driving them deep into the lungs and actually lifted the young man off his feet, punching him back into the second officer. Both men went down in a tangle of limbs.

  Pérez saw a faceful of scars.

  “Answer me,” the big man snarled.

  “Fuck you!” the detective spat. “Que te jodan!”

  The white haired man kneed him in the groin. White hot pain blossomed in the pit of his stomach and flowed up into his chest. Suddenly he could not breathe.

  “Tell me. Or I will hurt you.”

  José Pérez attempted to double over, but he was still pressed to the fence. He could feel moisture on his head, running down into his neck, had seen—dimly—what the man had done to the officer, he had felt the incredible fire in his groin. He was forty-seven years old … too old for this. He was going to throw up.

  “Last chance: answer me.”

  “There was a fire, a man, burnt to death.”

  “Where?”

  “In the guesthouse,” he whispered.

  “Where?” the big man demanded, raising a huge fist.

  “I’ve told you. In the guesthouse…”

  “Where. Specifically.”

  “Before a mirror.”

  The fist descended, smashing his head against the iron fencing.