Late at Night

by William Schoell

  She could make out what the ghost was saying very clearly now. Why did you do this to me? I thought you loved me, Jeremy. I thought surely you loved me. Why don’t you love me anymore? The poor thing was pleading with him, whining as if he were in the room with her, whispering so no one would discover them. It was the keening and pleading of a young girl in love, disillusioned. A young girl used and abandoned.

  In her terror, a thought started growing in the back of Joanne’s mind. Suppose she was to be possessed by the creature next, for she was sure that was what had happened to her friend Emily, still sleeping soundly in the bunk below. What if it should—God help her—enter her mind, force her to run about the way Emily had? What if, like Emily, she imagined herself to be bleeding from every orifice, wet, red blood pouring down her naked limbs like gushing water. No, she couldn’t stand to think of it. No. No. Only now did she fully realize what Emily must have gone through.

  Why don’t you love me anymore? I thought you loved me!

  The housekeeper’s nerves were at the breaking point. Scream, Joanne. Scream. Mrs. Plushing will get up and turn on the lights. Scream. Just open your mouth and scream!

  Instead, she found herself opening her eyes.

  Six feet away from the bed, hobbling pathetically across the room, was an apparition. It was a girl, no older than she was, naked, her eyes hollow and staring off into space. Blood was pouring out of the numerous jagged cuts in the flesh of her arms and stomach and breasts. Her face wore the most terrible, haunted, evil expressions that Joanne had ever seen on anyone. She looked quite dead, her skin dry and corpse-like, but she shambled towards the bunk bed jerkily, as if somehow animated from within.

  Joanne felt her heart pounding. Her body shook violently as she waged an inner battle in a vain attempt to shake off her fear and call for help.

  The bleeding woman was at the edge of the bed now, her body just below Joanne’s bunk and out of her sightline.

  Was it the housekeeper’s imagination? Or did she feel the groan of the springs of the bed underneath, as if the ghost-creature was stepping onto the lower mattress. No, it couldn’t be. Emily would have woken, screamed. Joanne couldn’t see anything anymore. The whole thing must have been a hallucination created by her fear and by her overactive imagination.

  Then a gnarled, bloodstained, long-nailed hand covered with a multitude of seeping sores poked up from below and grabbed hold of Joanne’s mattress, and the long dead servant girl began slowly, painfully, pulling herself up onto her bed.

  Chapter 20

  Ernie was flipping pages as fast as he could read, fascinated, resisting the morbid compulsion to flip to the end and see if “he” survived this imaginary (or was it?) adventure. What he’d read so far was enough to turn his hair white. There was some spooky stuff supposed to go on in the guest house that night, but he’d skipped over that rather quickly so he could see what was going to happen “tomorrow” before he fell asleep. The urge to put the book down, close his eyes, and go to sleep was nearly overwhelming. It was all he could do to keep his eyes focused on the page in front of him.

  Grisly. Awful. Such goings on. According to Mr. Schumann, one of Everson’s male employees was going to be dispatched—the characters’ new names confused him and he forgot exactly which man it was—sometime tomorrow. And those poor housekeepers. They were going to expire in a particularly gruesome manner. He blinked a few limes, rubbed his eyes. He was too tired to concentrate well on the story. He’d just finished reading about somebody, one of the women, getting lost on the island, and he’d already forgotten which woman it was. He was not only blurry-eyed, but vague, disordered thoughts were invading his consciousness just as they did when he began to fall asleep; a mixed-up jumble of words, ideas, and pictures from a dozen different people, magazines, and articles. Flip to the end, he told himself. It is most important to find out how it all ends. In case, just in case it turns out to be true. Impossible, he scoffed. But he had his doubts. Indubitably, this had to be the scariest book that he had ever read, since it was made to order, exploiting his own personal fears. What else could you expect from a book in which you were the main character?

  He read a little bit more, aghast at the fates in store for his companions. But he had to give up. He was just too tired. His eyes fell shut involuntarily. The book dropped out of his hands. In that mixed-up jumble of thoughts one thing came through loud and clear. According to Late at Night, one of the housekeepers was going to go through hell tonight.

  “Andrew Tennington” had read the early portions of the book he had found—yes, that was in there, too, the bit about finding a book set on the very same island, a story within a story within a story—and then he had fallen asleep. Same thing’s happening to me, Ernie thought, drifting deeper and deeper into slumber. Right about now, this is when that horrible thing is pulling itself up onto the bunkbed where the terrified housekeeper is lying. Right about now, this is when the housekeeper sees the corpse-like horror getting into bed with her and opens her mouth and screams.

  Ridiculous, Ernie thought, smiling in spite of his fear.

  And that’s when—though he was too tired to rouse himself and investigate, too tired, almost unnaturally so, to do anything but lay there semiconscious—he heard the sound of a scream coming unmistakably from the servants’ quarters.

  PART THREE

  Morning

  Chapter 21

  The members of the Lammerty Island expedition were all down having breakfast by 10 o’clock that morning. Gloria was chipper and buoyant, talking about the wonderful seaside air and what it did for her beauty sleep, constantly chatting about how refreshed and fulfilled she felt. She seemed oblivious to the smirks some of the others wore when she talked about being “fulfilled.” Sitting next to her smearing jam on his English muffin, Jerry looked positively exhausted.

  Lynn was more cheerful today. There was still an air of obvious tension between her and Everson, but she was clearly making an effort not to let whatever strain her relationship with the older man might be going through ruin the rest of the weekend. Everson was giving her all his attention, letting her hog the spotlight and play hostess. He was quite charming towards his younger lady love, so charming that the friction between the two of them seemed to be melting away as breakfast progressed.

  Andrea had not slept well—how could she on this island—but she found her spirits reviving and her mind becoming more alert in spite of it.

  That’s what a good breakfast and lively companions could do for you. Funny thing about Ernie, though; he seemed in a daze, had barely acknowledged her when she had said hello. And there she had been trying to be pleasant, trying to make up for the freakiness of the night before. Oh well, perhaps it was too late. Perhaps she had lost his attention for good. She wasn’t about to cry over it.

  Cynthia sipped her coffee, wiped her lips with a napkin, and looked Andrea right in the eye. “Did you and Mr. Thesinger find what you were looking for last night?” From the lascivious grin on Cynthia’s mouth it was clear she was not referring to the shipwreck. Andrea ignored her friend’s innuendo and replied, “Yes. But I wouldn’t let Ernie get near it. It was too foggy out. We came right back.”

  “Hmmm,” Cynthia said slyly to the rest of the table. “Did anyone hear the two of them come in? Was anyone still up at that hour?”

  “Cynthia,” Andrea scolded, smiling in spite of herself. “It wasn’t that late. Everyone went to bed early and you know it. There was nobody up when we got back.”

  “Then we have only your word for it that the two of you didn’t sleep on the beach and sneak in here to your beds at dawn.”

  Andrea shook her head. She looked over at Ernie to see how he was reacting—she thought he’d be blushing bright red now—but he was still in that odd mood of his. He ate his food listlessly, did not join in the conversation. He really must be exhausted. Andrea knew she wouldn’t get any help from that corner. But before Cynthia could go on with her verbal badinage, Anton made a
pronouncement.

  “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m quite anxious to explore the island this afternoon. I’m particularly interested in seeing the ruins of the old house. The one that’s still standing, that is. Perhaps we can even go inside.”

  Everson speared a sausage with his fork. “I don’t see why not. As long as we’re careful.”

  There was a little cough from the end of the table, and Betty, red-faced from the exertion, said, “Anton and I were talking about it last night. We have a mutual love for haunted houses, things like that.” She looked down at her plate shyly. When nobody spoke, she added, “When I was a little girl I used to love going to the abandoned homes in the neighborhood. We had two or three of them. Huge monsters that nobody wanted to buy, just left to fall apart and fill up with weeds.” Each sentence was punctuated by a pained little smile, as if she was asking for approval before continuing. “I wasn’t very brave. Friends of mine used to enter through broken windows and look around, and when they told me it was safe they’d open the front door and let me in. I’d never go in unless I knew it was safe. I—”

  “That’s how I felt about the water,” Cynthia said. “I still don’t think it’s safe.” She lit a cigarette, puffed, unconcerned about the discomfort the smoke might cause the others. Betty had not been through with her story, but that didn’t matter to Cynthia. Andrea was struck by the difference between Cynthia and Betty. Cynthia’s astonishing insensitivity; Betty’s crippling sensitivity. Cynthia rambled on about her first experiences with swimming and handsome lifeguards. Jerry listened with rapture to every word, while Gloria nibbled at her toast and said nothing. It was an effort for Betty to say something—everyone knew that—and here she’d built up her courage and Cynthia wouldn’t even let her finish. How much time had it taken Betty to pull herself together, to fortify herself to speak for so long? No one who hadn’t been shy in childhood as Andrea had been could ever conceive of what some people had to go through inside just to have the confidence to pass a simple remark.

  Andrea tuned Cynthia out and looked over at Ernie again. What was the matter with him anyway? He had hardly said a word during the whole meal. She was tired, too, but not to the point of catatonia. He looked worse than exhausted—he looked disturbed, preoccupied by something terrible.

  Cynthia was through with her swimming story. Anton and Lynn were now trying to convince Gloria to go with them on the walk to the main house, but Gloria was not at all enamored of the idea. “I’d much rather sit outside and feel that nice warm sun on my face. Walking through woods has never been my strong point. I’m much more the sitter type.”

  “You could use the exercise,” Jerry said, not unkindly.

  “We shouldn’t force her,” Cynthia said with surprising conviction. “If Glo doesn’t want to go she can stay and watch the fort. It’s just an old house anyway, Glo, you won’t be missing anything. Besides, think of all the bugs out there.”

  “Bugs,” Jerry laughed. “That did it. Gloria has shit fits when she sees a cockroach.”

  “Disgusting little creatures,” Gloria said as she suddenly squirmed in her seat. “Let’s not even talk about them. You say there are bugs out there in that jungle?” she asked Everson.

  The lawyer smiled patiently. “There are usually bugs outdoors, Gloria. There’s nothing we can do about it. And it’s just a forest, not a jungle.”

  “Well, I could have sworn I heard a bobcat screaming last night, out in the woods.”

  “I heard a scream coming from right in this house,” Cynthia said, her eyes opening wide from the memory. “I thought I must have been dreaming.”

  “I think I heard something, too,” Anton sniffed, scraping the last of his scrambled eggs from his plate. “Nearly startled the life out of me.”

  “Awww,” Jerry quipped. “It was probably just Gloria finding a bug in her bed.” Gloria glared at him playfully and snickered.

  Andrea did not remember the scream—how could she distinguish it from the inner screams within her own mind—but she noticed that Ernie had perked up a bit at the talk of it. “It came from the first floor, I’m sure of it,” Anton continued. “But when it stopped abruptly I figured one of the servants was playing a joke. It still was rather early if I recall. I meant to check my watch but it was on the dresser and I was too tired to get up and take a look.”

  “Did you hear anything, Ernie?” Lynn asked the writer. He shook his head, mumbled, looked as if he hadn’t heard her. Then Mrs. Plushing came into the room, and Everson told her what some of the others had heard. As usual, Mrs. Plushing knew what had happened all right.

  “Oh that. You heard it, did you? I’m so sorry, Mr. Everson, and all of you, for the disturbance.”

  “Well, what was it, woman?” Everson snapped.

  Margaret was used to his ways. “It was Joanne, this time. It seems she saw something last night, just like Emily did. Some kind of ghost. Of course, I told her it was nonsense. But she was scared out of her wits.”

  Andrea looked over to see if Ernie had heard. It seemed the spirit of Mary Lou Winters was a restless one.

  “Woke me up out of a sound sleep,” Margaret continued. “I turned on the light, and Joanne said the ghost disappeared. Some kind of dead girl, she said, all horrible-looking. Climbing to the top of her bunkbed. Anyway, she wouldn’t go back to sleep unless I let her get in bed with me. It’s a wonder I’m awake at all today, what with her shivering and moaning and stealing the covers for the rest of the night.”

  “Well, is she all right?” Lynn asked.

  “Oh yes, she’s fine now, miss. Emily was woken up, too, but she went right back to sleep without any trouble. Today both of the girls are convinced they just had some bad dreams, hallucinations, brought on by their own imaginations. Young girls, you know how they are.”

  “I’m a grown man,” Anton said. “And even I’m starting to get goosebumps.”

  The rest of the discussion was lost as Ernie suddenly jumped to his feet, a crazed and frightened expression in his eyes. He shouted “My God!” and took off to his room in a flash.

  “What the lord is the matter with him?” Mrs. Plushing asked.

  Chapter 22

  The book? Where is the book?

  Ernie had overturned the cot, ripped off the mattress, searched on the floor, in his baggage and in the trunk, in virtually every nook and cranny, but the novel was nowhere to be found. He had raced back outside to look at every title on the bookshelf, but Late at Night simply wasn’t there.

  Could I have dreamt it all? he wondered.

  He had been awakened by the sounds of the others climbing down the stairs for breakfast, by Mrs. Plushing’s whistling as she puttered around the dining room setting the table. He could smell coffee and bacon, and responded to those lovely aromas by getting out of bed. But he had been so tired, so doggone, unnaturally tired. There was something nagging at him in the back of his mind, something he couldn’t pinpoint, something he had to tell Andrea. But he simply could not remember what it was.

  All through breakfast it had worried him. Then they’d started talking about a scream. Yes, he had heard a scream. Instinctively, before anyone had told him, he had known it was one of the housekeepers screaming, but he’d hadn’t known how he knew. Something started to come together in the deepest recesses of his brain, started to poke its way out into his conscious mind. Then Mrs. Plushing had come in to tell her story, and it had all come rushing back to him.

  The book.

  He had rushed in here to find it, to see if it was real, but it had disappeared. He had looked everywhere. Either someone had taken it or it had never existed. He might never know for certain. It was so hard to think in this mental fog even now he wasn’t sure if he had actually sat in bed reading it, or if he had dreamt the whole thing: finding it, falling asleep, hearing the scream. The scream, at least, had been legitimate. But as for everything else, who knows?

  Yet for a moment there he had been so sure.

  P
erhaps he had only dreamed about the book; perhaps he’d experienced a psychic phenomena known as precognition. Maybe everyone in this island was in danger. Perhaps the book had been a warning in disguise. Or maybe last night there really had been a book: an omen, a prophecy, a warning in a tangible, physical form. Ernie would have to ask Andrea if such things could exist. Perhaps when its job had been over, the book had ceased to exist, returning to the netherland that had spawned it. The book, the substance or ectoplasm that formed it, had dissipated while he slept.

  But why? Why would such a thing happen? Why would a warning take such a form? The book had seemed so real, so real in every sense.

  There was no point telling the others about this until he had a chance to really think it over, to sort out fact and fiction and remember if there had actually been a book or not. The first thing he would do is get Andrea alone and tell her everything that had happened.

  But something still bothered him. If that book had been for real, if it had actually provided a peek into the future, then that meant that there wasn’t much time. Ernie remembered only the vaguest details; nothing specific, no names or places. Just that the book was about him and his comrades and took place on this island. Just that it promised horrible fates for all of them.

  Just that the slaughter would begin very soon.

  Chapter 23

  It took about twenty minutes to get to the main house, their little group stumbling over roots and through weedy patches, slapping at mosquitoes, and pointing collectively into the trees whenever a pleasant whistle would indicate the presence of a bird.

  It was hot today—further inland there were fewer cooling breezes. Cynthia wished she hadn’t worn her hot pants. She also wore a flimsy pink blouse that was tied below her breasts. She was showing plenty of skin, and her legs and arms and stomach were rapidly turning into feeding grounds for carnivorous insects. She had one thing to be grateful for. Gloria had stayed behind. That gave her a chance to get to know Jerry better without the old cow hovering around them. It was now or never. That moose hung on tightly at all other times.