“A horse?” Brian said, “You’ll take the dog and be thankful for it.”
The restaurant was Brian’s favorite in the area. He had a passion for curry stemming from the time when he lived only five minutes walk from Gibson Street in Glasgow, home of the first (and in Brian’s opinion the best) Indian restaurant in Britain.
One of the reasons he liked this one more than the others was the lack of Indian music. Once upon a time he had thought it ‘ethnic’ to have sitars twanging away over his curry. Until he talked to an Indian friend who informed him that the stuff played in restaurants was about as ethnic as the muzak heard in lifts or played over the test card on BBC1.
He had enjoyed showing off his command of the menu to Margaret, it being her first time in an Indian restaurant. He had ordered vast amounts of food.
The dishes just kept on coming...two portions of pakora as starters, two main course curries and a large portion of yogurt with a couple of vegetable side dishes and some Nan bread. He was amused to see her pupils widen in amazement as plate after plate of food arrived at their table.
“I’ll never get through all that Brian, I’m usually a small eater.”
“That’s all right,” he said through a mouthful of poppadom, “just eat what you can, I’ll polish off the rest. I’m a real glutton when it comes to curries.”
The meal passed in relative silence, conversation mainly limited to the food itself. However, by the time coffee had arrived, Brian had started probing into Margaret’s private life in his usual subtle manner.
“Okay, then, what’s going on between you and the pretty boy? Is there a chance I can prize you away from his clutches?”
Margaret smiled at this.
“Do I detect just a hint of jealousy?”
Brian felt the red flush on his cheeks and was grateful when she continued. He covered his embarrassment by hiding his lower face behind a palm-sized wedge of Nan bread.
“Pretty boy as you call him has given me up as a lost cause,” Margaret said. “He is far too concerned with pumping his weights and doing two hours training every night. He expected me to train with him all the time, to get into shape. I mean, I’m in good enough shape already, any more would just be going over the top.”
Mentally Brian agreed with her, but he never got time to comment as Margaret continued.
“So, he told me that I showed a lack commitment, that he was sorry but he couldn’t spend his time with a waster. Me…a waster.”
She stopped to chew a piece of bread before continuing.
“So I gave him a piece of my mind, called him a narcissistic egotist or something and stormed out. Since then he doesn’t speak to me apart from when work requires it.
“Anyway, I was never convinced that he didn’t prefer the schoolboys to me in the first place. Does that satisfy your curiosity?”
The last was accompanied by a sideways look, and a small grin that turned mischievous as she spoke.
“And what about you? I hear you’ve been having romantic encounters with that wee lab technician in the Physics Department.”
The incident with the technician had been Brian’s biggest embarrassment in recent months. He had been in the large cupboard under the stairs searching for a light stage for a microscope when the technician had come in carrying a large bundle of test tubes.
The girl was seventeen, having left school the previous year. She was a tall willowy blonde with a very large bust, the subject of much discussion amongst the male staff.
Just as she entered the room, the door was slammed shut behind her and the light, which was controlled from the corridor outside, was switched off. She shrieked loudly and dropped the test tubes, which promptly smashed all over the floor.
She shrieked again as Brian touched her shoulder and passed out in a dead faint. When Jim Fletcher opened the door he found Brian with the girl in his arms.
Ever since then Brian was baited at every opportunity by the male staff that refused to believe that he hadn’t planned it all from the start.
Margaret had obviously noticed his discomfort and was taking some delight in teasing him about it.
“Why Brian, you’re blushing. Did you know that you’re cute when you blush?”
He knew he was going red. If his face got any hotter it would certainly explode.
“Cute? Cute, you say? I don’t think I’ve been called cute since my mother dressed me in a kilt for my sister’s christening when I was six. Do you know what being called cute does for a man’s ego? It makes him feel like a doll or a cuddly toy.”
He still couldn’t meet her eyes...the red flush seemed to spread over his body and his clothes suddenly felt hot and stifling. He started to change the subject when Margaret spoke.
“But, Brian, I take my cuddly toys to bed with me and give them a big hug before I go to sleep.”
He looked up into her eyes but could see only wide-eyed innocence and a big grin. A woman had not teased him for a long time, but he decided that the wait had been worth it. A cuddly toy indeed! Given half a chance he’d show her something that her teddy bear would never have done.
~-o0O0o-~
Tom sat up straight in bed, every nerve straining, the dream fading slowly, leaving only a vague sense of unease that was quickly dispersed by the nausea rising from his stomach to his throat.
Christ! What did I eat?
He had only a vague recollection of buying fish and chips on his way home.
I’ll wring that Italian’s neck if I’ve got food poisoning from his three-day-old fish.
He had meant to get some Alka Seltzer from the cabinet in the toilet, but by the time he reached the door he knew that if wouldn’t help.
The next five minutes were not very pleasant as Tom Duncan emptied his stomach completely. He knew from experience that once the ‘dry heaves’ began the worst would be over and, by having a couple of glasses of milk, he could get his system into nearly normal working action.
He was wrong though…the milk didn’t work…it didn’t quench the thirst. What he needed was a real drink. The trouble was, there wasn’t a single drop of alcohol in the house. He remembered that he’d finished off the last of the whisky the night before…half a bottle… just enough to get him to sleep.
That didn’t stop him looking though, and in the space of the next five minutes he emptied every cupboard in the house, spilling the contents over floors, chairs and beds as his search got ever more frantic. It was to no avail, and Tom looked at the clock with dismay, confirming what he already knew…it was well after closing time. There was nowhere open in the town that would sell him alcohol.
He knew that he could ring up Brian, that the young teacher was bound to have booze in the house, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it…it would be too much like a last admission of defeat. There was nothing else for it…it would have to be black coffee and a sleepless night until the first supermarket opened in the morning.
At least his armchair was comfortable, and he almost managed to lose himself in the procedural language of the 87th Precinct, but the call of the booze was running wild through his body.
He had to put the book down. Every other page had a reference to bourbon or beer or some bar or other. He tried the radio and got ‘Tonight the bottle let me down’. Ten minutes later he stood by the window, just staring out into the empty night, trying, but not succeeding, to make his mind a complete blank.
~-o0O0o-~
He’d been staring at his car for a good minute before he remembered the glove compartment…the snug little box that held his emergency supply…a half bottle of the golden nectar. He could almost hear it calling to him as he hurried out of the door and down the drive.
There was a bad moment when he thought he’d misplaced his keys, but after some fumbling around he found them nestled amongst the loose change in his left-hand pocket. His hands shook as he tried twice to get the key in the lock, and he had to take a deep breath and calm himself before he was successful. He slid i
nto the driver’s seat and sighed deeply as he opened the glove compartment and took out the bottle.
The whisky glowed redly in the streetlights, almost fluorescent in its depths, and his hands trembled again as his body twitched in anticipation of the soon-to-come hit. He lifted the bottle to his lips and readied himself for the first swallow.
The liquor had just touched his lips when a voice almost close enough to be inside his head caused him to start, a long remembered voice that drove all other thoughts from his mind. The whisky bottle fell to his lap, its contents draining away forgotten now as Tom turned towards the sound.
You don’t need that Tom, the voice said, loud again, seeming to come from inside his ear itself. And when he turned, he saw what he already knew, his wife, his dead wife, Jessie, was standing beside the car door, her arms open in welcome.
Come on. You know how we used to keep the old pain away.
Tom pushed himself out of the car and into her arms, not needing a second chance. Somewhere down at the back of his mind he knew that this could not be happening, that there was something very wrong, but the voice was seductive and, when he reached her, her body was soft.
She grabbed him, tight, and held him firm. There were hot tears in Tom’s eyes as he returned the embrace.
“Oh, Jessie. Oh Jessie. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” he said, crying into her shoulder.
She held him tighter, stroking his hair with soft hands, then tighter still as she buried her head in his neck. Tom could smell her hair, clean and freshly washed. Her perfume intoxicated him, that heady musk that she had always loved and he had always forgotten to buy for her. He was almost frightened to return her embrace for fear that his hands would meet only thin, lifeless air. But her grip on him felt strong, it felt warm…it felt like redemption.
Her head buried further into his neck and there was a sharp stab of pain, but Tom barely noticed it as he held her tight and felt all his worries flow away.
They waltzed across the pavement, each held tight in the grip of the other, and Tom felt relaxed, as he had not done for long years. He tried to speak, to tell her his feelings, but the effort was too much. He sunk further into the embrace and let the warm feeling take him away.
~-o0O0o-~
The night was clear and crisp, a cool sea breeze wafting over the large flat blocks of red sandstone on which Brian and Margaret were sitting. From their position just inches away from the water line, the sea looked like a flat plate of glass with a thin layer of water laid over the top of it.
The waves lapped at the shore, the surface of the water being ruffled only slightly by the light wind.
Out over the water the moon, almost full, illuminated the islands of the Firth of Clyde, Cumbrae in the foreground, the blue peaks of Arran in the background, each showing only a handful of the yellow lights denoting habitation.
Only the occasional car on the road two hundred yards back from the shore, and the screeching howls of the night gulls, disturbed the calm. They had arrived here half an hour before and had barely spoken a dozen sentences to each other, both filling themselves up with the quiet.
Margaret noticed his troubled frown.
“A penny for your thoughts?” she said.
“A penny, in this day and age, what with inflation and all, it must be about a fiver.”
Forced jollity never works, he told himself, and he was right. She refused to be put off and Brian, glad of the chance to talk to someone, unburdened his worries, starting with Tom, moving on to Ian and finally to Sandy, including his story about the house.
She fell silent for long seconds before she replied.
“Come off it Brian, you can’t believe that they’re all connected. Ian’s death was an accident, and Tom and Sandy have just got caught up in some mild form of hysteria.
“There’s been a lot of occult and horror on the telly recently, and it preys on folks minds. And as for that story about the house...”
She shook her head, grinning at him.
“Surely you know that Sandy would do anything for a drink. The old man is unscrupulous when it comes tae whisky.”
Brian was shaking his head.
“No, I don’t think it was just a story. Oh, when he first told me I was sure he was spinning me a line, but the more I think about it the more I’m sure it had a ring of truth. Somehow I would have known if it were just another story.”
Brian looked round and noticed Margaret grinning at him. He had the feeling that he was having his leg pulled again.
“Well, there’s one way to find out Brian. Why don’t we take the moor road back home and we can check out whether there’s anything in it?”
The idea of visiting that house at night didn’t really appeal to him much, but it gave him a chance to be with Margaret a bit longer so he agreed, only if his car proved capable of negotiating the one in six hill up on to the moor.
“And if it doesn’t,” he warned her, “I’ll have to show you where the holes for your feet are.”
~-o0O0o-~
Tom was getting weaker.
The lights in the street seemed to dim, and darkness crept in at the edges of his sight. But he felt happy and warm, snug in the arms of his wife as they continued their waltz across the pavement.
He was back in nineteen seventy-three. The band was playing something soft and smooth, the lights were dim, and they were locked together in a slow dance. It had been a great day…the long walk in the country under the bluest of skies, the late lunch in that quiet little pub and, best of all, the slow lovemaking in their marriage bed. Then some long cold drinks before dressing up for a night on the town.
“I love you, Jessie,” he whispered. He hadn’t said that nearly often enough back then. But she had known it. Hadn’t she?
He was happy then, and he was happy now. No school kids, no headmasters, no booze, and Jessie back warm and loving in his arms.
Tom felt his eyes close and his head sank to rest on Jessie’s shoulders. His legs threatened to buckle under him, but he stayed upright…held by Jessie’s strong arms. Suddenly there was a jolt and her body stiffened, a single jerk. Tom opened his eyes fully and was amazed to see a crossbow bolt sticking from Jessie’s neck.
Only it wasn’t Jessie any more.
Tom looked up into the blood red eyes of a huge naked man.
No, not a man.
Twin fangs dripping red hung over its lower lip and its face was set in a wild, manic grin. Tom tried to scream, but only a feeble squeal came out…a moan of despair. He tried to struggle but his limbs were too heavy and didn’t want to respond to his commands.
Instead the creature that had hold of him screamed, a cacophony of noise that echoed around in Tom’s head and filled all the empty spaces inside him. It lifted him into the air and threw him over one shoulder as if he weighed no more than an armchair cushion.
His world spun and whirled threatening to bring on a fresh bout of vomiting. He tried to concentrate on the pavement beneath him, but even thinking seemed like too much effort. The creature let out one more long howl that caused lights to flick on in bedrooms all along the street. It began to run, with Tom bouncing along in time.
Somewhere behind them Tom heard the sound of running footsteps, but by then the blackness was creeping in ever further. They moved faster now, the streetlights passing overhead in an almost hypnotic string of dancing lights. The pursuing footsteps faded in the distance, but the creature’s pace didn’t slow.
Soon there were no street lights overhead, only the grasping black branches of trees. But by that time the darkness had taken over fully and Tom was past caring.
~-o0O0o-~
Brian stopped the car at the gates of the Hansen House and turned to Margaret.
“We don’t have to do this you know. I’ve got some great coffee back at the house.”
Margaret snorted.
“Coffee is it. And what have you got planned for afters? No. If we’re going to banish your demons then we have to have a loo
k. Besides,” she said with grin, “Don’t you think a walk in the moonlight will be more romantic?”
Brian wasn’t amused.
“The last thing this place could be called is romantic. You’ve never been here before…have you?”
Margaret shook her head as Brian continued.
“Old Sandy’s story might be a load of bollocks, but even when I was a kid we kept clear of this place…especially at night. Sometimes, but only in bright daylight, we’d come up to collect chestnuts, but they were always soft and rotten.”
Margaret was about to interrupt, but when she turned towards Brian she saw that his stare was far away, remembering.
“There were stories about a gamekeeper with a shotgun and a pack of fearsome dogs, but I never saw him. There was an old orchard, on the other side of the house from here. You used to be able to get inside, but it was all overgrown with thorn bushes.
“Back in the sixties there was a story that did the rounds about the ghost of an old woman who collected the fruit in there. My mate Doug swore he saw her late one summer’s night, but I don’t think he had the balls to come here in the dark.”
Margaret realized that he was stalling, delaying the moment when he had to get out of the car.
“Hey,” she said, waving a hand in front of his eyes. “What is this? Nostalgia night? Less of the chat and more action. Let’s get out there and see what we can see.”
“Just let me have a cigarette first?” Brian said, but Margaret stopped his hand on the way to the glove compartment.
“Nope. No smoking…I’ve got my reputation as a Sports Teacher to consider, remember? Come on,” she said, opening the passenger door. “Time to go.”
Brian finally stepped out into the dark. The night got a lot cooler and he tried to pull his jacket tighter around him as he followed Margaret to the imposing wrought iron gateway to the drive.
The whole gate looked like it had been carved from one piece of black iron...more like a medieval portcullis than anything more recent. Great sinuous serpents wound their way through and around Doric columns of iron and a great square lock controlled the center.
Eldren: The Book of the Dark Page 9