It was in May that we heard of Mrs. Maradick’s death, and exactly a year later, on a mild and fragrant afternoon, when the daffodils were blooming in patches around the old fountain in the garden, the housekeeper came into the office, where I lingered over some accounts, to bring me news of the doctor’s approaching marriage.
“It is no more than we might have expected,” she concluded rationally. “The house must be lonely for him—he is such a sociable man. But I can’t help feeling,” she brought out slowly after a pause in which I felt a shiver pass over me, “I can’t help feeling that it is hard for that other woman to have all the money poor Mrs. Maradick’s first husband left her.”
“There is a great deal of money, then?” I asked curiously.
“A great deal.” She waved her hand, as if words were futile to express the sum. “Millions and millions!”
“They will give up this house, of course?”
“That’s done already, my dear. There won’t be a brick left of it by this time next year. It’s to be pulled down and an apartment-house built on the ground.”
Again the shiver passed over me. I couldn’t bear to think of Mrs. Maradick’s old home falling to pieces.
“You didn’t tell me the name of the bride,” I said. “Is she someone he met while he was in Europe?”
“Dear me, no! She is the very lady he was engaged to before he married Mrs. Maradick, only she threw him over, so people said, because he wasn’t rich enough. Then she married some lord or prince from over the water; but there was a divorce, and now she has turned again to her old lover. He is rich enough now, I guess, even for her!”
It was all perfectly true, I suppose; it sounded as plausible as a story out of a newspaper; and yet while she told me I felt, or dreamed that I felt, a sinister, an impalpable hush in the air. I was nervous, no doubt; I was shaken by the suddenness with which the housekeeper had sprung her news on me; but as I sat there I had quite vividly an impression that the old house was listening—that there was a real, if invisible, presence somewhere in the room or the garden. Yet, when an instant afterwards I glanced through the long window which opened down to the brick terrace, I saw only the faint sunshine over the deserted garden, with its maze of box, its marble fountain, and its patches of daffodils.
The housekeeper had gone—one of the servants, I think, came for her—and I was sitting at my desk when the words of Mrs. Maradick on that last evening floated into my mind. The daffodils brought her back to me; for I thought, as I watched them growing, so still and golden in the sunshine, how she would have enjoyed them. Almost unconsciously I repeated the verse she had read to me:
“If thou hast two loaves of bread, sell one and buy daffodils”—and it was at this very instant, while the words were still on my lips, that I turned my eyes to the box maze, and saw the child skipping rope along the gravelled path to the fountain. Quite distinctly, as clear as day, I saw her come, with what children call the dancing step, between the low box borders to the place where the daffodils bloomed by the fountain. From her straight brown hair to her frock of Scotch plaid and her little feet, which twinkled in white socks and black slippers over the turning rope, she was as real to me as the ground on which she trod or the laughing marble boys under the splashing water. Starting up from my chair, I made a single step to the terrace. If I could only reach her—only speak to her—I felt that I might at last solve the mystery. But with the first flutter of my dress on the terrace, the airy little form melted into the quiet dusk of the maze. Not a breath stirred the daffodils, not a shadow passed over the sparkling flow of the water; yet, weak and shaken in every nerve, I sat down on the brick step of the terrace and burst into tears. I must have known that something terrible would happen before they pulled down Mrs. Maradick’s home.
The doctor dined out that night. He was with the lady he was going to marry, the housekeeper told me; and it must have been almost midnight when I heard him come in and go upstairs to his room. I was downstairs because I had been unable to sleep, and the book I wanted to finish I had left that afternoon in the office. The book—I can’t remember what it was—had seemed to me very exciting when I began it in the morning; but after the visit of the child I found the romantic novel as dull as a treatise on nursing. It was impossible for me to follow the lines, and I was on the point of giving up and going to bed, when Doctor Maradick opened the front door with his latchkey and went up the staircase. “There can’t be a bit of truth in it,” I thought over and over again as I listened to his even step ascending the stairs. “There can’t be a bit of truth in it.” And yet, though I assured myself that “there couldn’t be a bit of truth in it,” I shrank, with a creepy sensation, from going through the house to my room in the third storey. I was tired out after a hard day, and my nerves must have reacted morbidly to the silence and the darkness. For the first time in my life I knew what it was to be afraid of the unknown, of the unseen; and while I bent over my book, in the glare of the electric light, I became conscious presently that I was straining my senses for some sound in the spacious emptiness of the rooms overhead. The noise of a passing motor-car in the street jerked me back from the intense hush of expectancy; and I can recall the wave of relief that swept over me as I turned to my book again and tried to fix my distracted mind on its pages.
I was still sitting there when the telephone on my desk rang, with what seemed to my overwrought nerves a startling abruptness, and the voice of the superintendent told me hurriedly that Doctor Maradick was needed at the hospital. I had become so accustomed to these emergency calls in the night that I felt reassured when I had rung up the doctor in his room and had heard the hearty sound of his response. He had not yet undressed, he said, and would come down immediately while I ordered back his car, which must just have reached the garage.
“I’ll be with you in five minutes!” he called as cheerfully as if I had summoned him to his wedding.
I heard him cross the floor of his room; and before he could reach the head of the staircase, I opened the door and went out into the hall in order that I might turn on the light and have his hat and coat waiting. The electric button was at the end of the hall, and as I moved towards it, guided by the glimmer that fell from the landing above, I lifted my eyes to the staircase, which climbed dimly, with its slender mahogany balustrade, as far as the third storey. Then it was, at the very moment when the doctor, humming gaily, began his quick descent of the steps, that I distinctly saw—I will swear to this on my deathbed—a child’s skipping rope lying loosely coiled, as if it had dropped from a careless little hand, in the bend of the staircase. With a spring I had reached the electric button, flooding the hall with light; but as I did so, while my arm was still outstretched behind me, I heard the humming voice change to a cry of surprise or terror, and the figure on the staircase tripped heavily and stumbled with groping hands into emptiness. The scream of warning died in my throat while I watched him pitch forward down the long flight of stairs to the floor at my feet. Even before I bent over him, before I wiped the blood from his brow and felt for his silent heart, I knew that he was dead.
Something—it may have been, as the world believes, a misstep in the dimness, or it may have been, as I am ready to bear witness, an invisible judgement—something had killed him at the very moment when he most wanted to live.
DEREK GUNN
(1964–)
Born in Dublin, Derek Gunn as a boy avidly read science fiction, horror stories, thrillers, fantasy, and Westerns while collecting American Marvel and DC comics. A graduate of the College of Marketing and Design and the Marketing Institute of Ireland, he has been designing communication networks for international businesses for over twenty years as a consultant for a major global telecommunications company. He is the author of four novels of a postapocalyptic thriller series, Vampire Apocalypse: A World Torn Asunder (2006), Descent into Chaos (2008), Fallout (2009), and The Estuary (2009), as well as numerous short stories. A member of the Horror Writers Association and th
e International Thriller Writers Association, he is a contributing editor for the latter, publishing a monthly column in which he interviews and reviews the work of a range of authors.
The Third Option
(2007)
“I fucking hate dead people,” Deputy William Boyle whined as he reached for his hat. Outside the wind howled and threw sand against the windows of the small jail, the sound crackling like bacon sizzling on a pan. “I mean why can’t we just put them back in the ground where they belong?”
Sheriff Amos Carter waited impatiently for his deputy and tried to ignore the pounding in his head. Boyle was a good man but inexperienced. He also asked way too many questions, but he had just become a father yesterday and they had celebrated far too much the previous night. Carter decided he would allow him a little leeway, but only as much as his throbbing head would tolerate, and his limit was fast approaching. “Now, Will,” Carter sighed, “you know as well as I do that the Governor has ordered that these dead folk be left alone until they can decide whether they have a legal right to walk around.”
“And what if they decide that they don’t?” Boyle pressed him.
“Then,” Carter sighed and slapped his thigh impatiently, “you can put them back in the ground. Now hurry up. We have to let him know about our town rules before he goes and breaks any of ’em.”
“I’m coming,” Boyle pouted, “but I still can’t figure out what the good Lord was thinking ’bout when he sent ’em back to clutter up the place.”
“It had nothing to do with the Lord’s work as you well know.” Carter pushed the younger man out the door where his startled cry was ripped from his mouth by the wind.
The day was young. The sun was still climbing in the sky. Sand swirled around the two men and forced them to pull their bandanas up over their noses and mouths. Carter cursed as his eyes were assaulted by the sand and he hunched up further as the wind snapped at him. It was June. Normally the sun would already be hot enough to fry an egg, but the sand was so thick after a dry month that the wind had whipped it up easily and it was blocking most of the heat. He squinted upward but could only see a vague outline of the sun through the storm. The weak glow cast the town in an eerie, diffused light.
The two men hurried to the saloon. Carter was thankful the storm cut off any further questions Boyle might have had. The subject of the dead walking around was confusing enough to him without having to come up with answers for an overeager deputy as well.
Of course it would be easier to just kill them all, but one of the buggers had petitioned the Governor that the dead still had rights. He had argued that the fact that they no longer breathed did not necessarily change their legal status and the Governor’s legal experts did not have any counter to that argument. Until the lawyers got their act together, they would have to put up with their share of visitors, although few of them came this far upstate.
It had all started two years ago as an act of final defiance by an Indian shaman before his tribe had been kicked off their land. Nobody knew for certain what had happened. The accepted version was that an Indian shaman had put a curse on the white man that “the dead would rise and ravage that which he held most dear.” Carter assumed that the Shaman had meant for the dead to kill the living but something had gone wrong. The dead did crave that which the white man held most dear, there was no argument about that, it was just that the shaman had miscalculated on the white man’s priorities. It wasn’t life that the white man held most precious. Out here in the west, it was gold that men lusted after. Gold meant power. Of course some idiot had gone and killed the shaman in the meantime so the curse could not be reversed. So for now at least, they were stuck with the dead folk.
The two men reached the wooden boardwalk, which stretched from Tracy’s Hardware to the hotel. The saloon was about halfway along, past a barbershop, a few houses and the doctor’s office. The path boasted a wooden canopy so they were shielded from the brunt of the storm as they continued walking. Unfortunately this also meant that it afforded Boyle the opportunity to launch into another question and, as if on cue, he did just that. “It’s kind’a weird, don’t you think?”
“What’s that?” Carter rolled his eyes and reminded himself that Boyle was the only able-bodied man in the town willing to work for the wages that the state paid.
“This gold thing.”
The dead craved gold and needed it to survive. They needed it as surely as man needed food. “Is there anything in particular or is it everything in general that you find weird?”
“Well, why do they drink it?”
Carter could understand the young man’s confusion. He had been incredulous himself when he had heard it. He had since found out that hundreds of years ago kings and queens in Europe frequently took gold in the same fashion, believing that anything so expensive must be good for them. The problem now was that the living also coveted gold, and so trouble had begun almost as soon as the dead’s cravings became common knowledge.
Carter sighed and stopped. Boyle didn’t notice for a moment and continued on and had to hurry back. He smiled sheepishly. “Look. These things are dead. If we left them alone they’d eventually rot away and solve all our problems. Unfortunately that shaman worked some weird shit and gold slows their rotting. And before you ask I don’t know how.” Carter put his hand up to enforce his statement. “Anyway their teeth ain’t as strong as they used to be so they have to take it in a drink or as a handful of finely shaved dust.” Carter had had enough questions. “Bill,” he placed a shoulder on the young man’s shoulders. “I’ll handle this. You go on over to Muriel in the hotel and let her know the Governor will be here later today. No doubt he’ll want his usual suite.”
“That’s the fourth time this month.” Boyle grinned lasciviously. “Those bedsprings must be bust by now.”
“The Governor’s sexual antics are no concern of yours,” Carter admonished him and then grinned. “Mind you keep your mouth shut though. If his wife finds out he’ll probably fire us just for spite.”
The younger man grinned and headed off toward the hotel, giving Carter a moment to collect his thoughts before he entered the saloon. He pushed open the battered swinging doors to the saloon and winced as the hinges creaked and sent pain stabbing through his already delicate head. He stood for a moment and breathed a sigh of relief as he brushed dust and grit from his clothes. Outside, the church began summoning the faithful to worship and the incessant tolling of the bells reverberated painfully in his head.
Carter looked around the saloon, taking in his surroundings in a practised glance. He hadn’t survived twenty years as a lawman by being stupid. He had long ago perfected the ability to read the occupants in a room by their stance or the looks on their faces when he entered a room, even when he was suffering from a hangover. Long slabs of wood lay on top of numerous barrels and dominated the room in front of him. The wooden planks acted as a bar until the new one arrived from St. Louis. The owner had promised the town a beautiful mahogany bar, with brass fittings, though Carter would miss this beer-stained monstrosity when it went; it had a certain charm. Large ornate oil lamps hung from the low ceiling. They burned merrily and cast deep shadows into the corners of the room. Tables lay scattered around the room in a chaotic jumble that seemed to have no plan other than to fit as many customers as possible into a relatively small space.
His eyes were drawn immediately to three Mexicans in the corner. The three men leaned in on the table conspiratorially with their elbows on the edges. Their quick, furtive glances toward Peterson behind the bar intimated some illicit activity, though their harsh accented voices and guttural laughter were far too loud to suggest anything he needed to be involved in. They were probably looking for somewhere to ride out the storm and had their own bottle hidden under the table rather than pay the exorbitant prices Peterson charged. Their clothes were simple and of poor quality. They did not appear to have weapons of any kind. His eyes continued to scan the room.
It was
early yet so only two girls prowled the floor. Their gaudy colours and heavy makeup were more suited to the dim lighting of the evening. The morning’s brightness, though somewhat subdued from the storm, illuminated their tired faces and lustreless hair more than they probably would have liked. They looked up with hope in their eyes as the doors creaked and announced his entry but they quickly lost interest when they saw him. The “moral majority” in the town constantly put him under pressure to run the girls out, but the law still tolerated their profession. Until that changed he could do nothing, though he did make sure that he was seen as neutral and that meant keeping his distance from both groups.
John Peterson stood behind the bar in his usual boiled white shirt and brocaded vest. He sported an overly-large moustache as if to compensate for the lack of hair on his head. His ruddy complexion hinted at an addiction to the liquor he sold. He rubbed furiously at a glass and moved his head toward the far corner of the bar. Carter nodded and glanced over toward the indicated table near the window where a lone man sat.
He spent another moment casually brushing dust from his clothes and used the time to look the stranger over. The man’s boots and jeans were almost the same color, with the natural fading of the materials and the dirt encrusted liberally over them both. He wore a dark blue shirt of good quality, though the material was worn in places and the collar was frayed. A black vest with three silver buttons, dulled from lack of attention, completed the man’s wardrobe. He also wore a matching black hat that cast a shadow over his face but Carter could see that he was relatively clean shaven and that his hair was still quite short, the ends only curling slightly above the frayed collar.
Vampires, Zombies, Werewolves and Ghosts Page 16